Newly funded research that will occur right here in New York City hopes to shed light on and unravel the genetic and environmental causes of autism. Columbia University researchers, in collaboration with colleagues at the Norwegian Institute of Public Health, recently received a five-year $13-million grant from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to fund one of the largest studies of neurodevelopmental disorders ever conducted. The study, initially focused on autism, will follow up to 100,000 pregnancies, from the first trimester through childhood and perhaps adulthood, via access to a birth registry in Norway. The research will evaluate whether environmental influences interact with a person’s genes at critical times in development to cause autism. “We are using the latest information and technologies from genetics, microbiology, toxicology, functional genomics and proteomics to examine the seeds of disease, from gestation across a person’s life span. This approach should reveal clues to chronic diseases,” says Dr. W. Ian Lipkin, Jerome L. and Dawn Greene Professor of Epidemiology at Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health, and a professor of neurology and pathology at Columbia’s College of Physicians & Surgeons in New York City, and principal investigator of the study. According to the Autism Society of America (ASA), autism is a complex developmental disability that typically appears during the first three years of life. Autism impacts the normal development of the brain in the areas of social interaction and communication skills. Children and adults with autism typically have difficulties in verbal and non-verbal communication, social interactions, and leisure or play activities. As many as 1.5 million Americans today are believed to have some form of autism. And that number is on the rise. Based on statistics from the U.S. Department of Education and other governmental agencies, autism is growing at a rate of 10 percent to 17 percent per year. At these rates, the ASA estimates that the prevalence of autism could reach 4 million Americans in the next decade. One researcher on the front lines of autism research, Eric Hollander, M.D., professor of psychiatry and director of the Seaver Center of Excellence for Autism Research and Treatment at the Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York City, says the new study “is an important study and one approach to tease apart the separate environmental factors and take care of methodological issues that can compound interpretation.” He says, “It is clear there are very strong genetic factors associated with autism, but also environmental or ‘epi-genetic’ factors that may play a role in what has been regarded as increasing presence of autism.” That is why it is important to look at a large database, as the new study will, Dr. Hollander says.
Future is Looking Brighter Every Day “There are a lot of important new findings in genes associated with the different components of autism syndrome, as well as new treatments for specific symptoms,” Dr. Hollander says. “The future is looking much brighter. The good news is that any one individual with autism, particularly if interventions are started early, can do well and end up being mainstream.” It is clear, he adds, that autism is much more common than previously believed. The Seaver Center recently received a Center of Excellence award from the NIH to bring together basic research and conduct genetic testing. Research will include family/genetic studies, brain imaging studies and biological, as well as autoimmune, neuropsychiatric and psychosocial and medication treatment studies. To vaccinate or not to vaccinate, though? That is the question for many parents who grew concerned in the past few years when some studies linked autism with certain vaccines. But the latest studies are reassuring, he says. One study, of 140,000 individual members of a large health maintenance organization, looked at vaccines overall and found no association between vaccines and the development of autism. “So while there may be environmental factors, it doesn’t look like [vaccines] really play a role,” Dr. Hollander says.
