Autism in Kenya, organoid research: In this week’s roundup, check out several papers on autism-linked genes, including PTEN, MECP2 and SYNGAP1. The list also includes a new paper documenting the prevalence of neurodevelopmental conditions in Kenya, co-authored by Amina Abubakar, who was featured in a Transmitter profile earlier this year. More autism research we spotted:
The following is a personal essay that reflects the opinion of its author. November 24, 2025 U.S. Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., has never attended medical school. He has no prior experience in formulating public health policy and no training in neurodevelopmental disorders. His opinions on the causes of autism have […]
This collection of Spectrum articles from the past 12 months highlights expert perspectives on autism’s heritability and its link to biological sex, the value of transdiagnostic frameworks, and the field’s future, among other topics.
Autism research is highly focused on causation and autism “treatments,” areas most autistic people neither benefit from nor want studied. Enter AutINSAR, a much-needed discussion between autistic people, autism researchers, family members, and professionals about priorities in autism research. This year’s AutINSAR chat took place during INSAR 2025, the annual meeting of the International Society […]
When COVID-19 shut down labs worldwide, Jordan Farrell, then a postdoctoral researcher at Stanford University, faced a dilemma. His work on the distinct roles of dentate spikes and sharp wave ripples in the hippocampus demanded extensive neural recordings from multiple brain regions simultaneously—a daunting experimental setup in the best of times and nearly impossible during […]
Program will estimate costs needed for Common Start legislation (H. 605 / P. 362) A UMass Boston-based interdisciplinary team of researchers has launched a new research project that will build a cost simulator to inform policy recommendations around universal child care. The simulator will model the amount of funding required by the Common Start legislation […]
Zachary J Williams MD/PhD college studentVanderbilt University When Zachary Williams joined the Autistic Researchers Committee of the International Society for Autism Research (INSAR), he that knew one of the group’s priorities would be to promote participatory research — an approach in which scientists work with autistic people and other members of the autism community to […]
“So, have you found any autism in Africa?” the wealthy philanthropist asked, peering over his wine glass. It was 2012, and Petrus de Vries had just returned to South Africa after 20 years abroad. The University of Cape Town, where he had been hired to set up an autism research center, was hosting a cocktail […]
Illustration by Laurenne Boglio Welcome back to By the Numbers, Spectrum’s data-centric take on autism research. Let us know what you think of the newsletter at niko@spectrumnews.org, and thanks for reading. Total funding for autism research in the United States nearly doubled between 2008 and 2018, according to data from the Interagency Autism Coordinating Committee, […]
Illustration by Laurenne Boglio As regular readers know, this newsletter takes pains to highlight autism research tweets — but do tweets really help papers take flight? It’s tough to quantify the impact, beyond simple tallies of retweets and likes. A new paper this week attempts the calculation, linking social-media shares and news coverage with actual […]
Chennai: In a bid to address the issues in school education, the Tamil Nadu government has undertaken core research activities, including the impact of social media and mobile apps on learning habits among students. Accordingly, the Tamil Nadu State Council of Educational Research and Training (SCERT), a wing of the School Education Department, has been […]
Early on in her first postdoctoral position, Hollis Cline demonstrated her characteristic flair for creative problem-solving. Cline, who calls herself Holly, and her advisor, neuroscientist Martha Constantine-Paton, wanted to study the brain’s “topographic maps” — internal representations of sensory input from the outside world. These maps are thought to shape a person’s ability to process […]
