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Another 34 genes have been linked with autism spectrum disorder, according to a presentation yesterday (October 16) at the American Society of Human Genetics annual meeting in San Diego.
Harvard Medical School graduate student Jack Kosmicki and his colleagues studied exome sequences of 37,269 individuals with autism and pinpointed 99 genes that could play a role in causing the disorder, 65 of which had previously been identified. The new result builds on work from the last decade and provides a “very accurate list” of genes that Kosmicki and his colleagues are confident play a role in the disorder.
“Autism is a common condition, but we don’t know its cause. We think it is predominantly genetic, so if we can understand the underlying biology, we can develop a therapy for the symptoms of the disorder,” Stephan Sanders, a geneticist and pediatrician at the University of California, San Francisco, ...
