Families invited to join study of autism genetics

Each Monday morning, a team of psychiatrists, psychologists, behavioral specialists, social workers, and nurses at University of Iowa Hospitals and Clinics meets to do what they often call “detective work.”

Researchers aiming to understand why autism spectrum disorders (ASD) are more common in boys have discovered differences in a brain signaling pathway involved in reward learning and motivation that makes male mice more vulnerable to an autism-causing genetic glitch.