A collaborative research group of Nippon Medical School, RIKEN and others has shown that serotonin in the developmental stage may be involved in the onset mechanism of autism in experiments using model mice.

 Autism is one of the developmental disorders characterized by "lack of social communication ability" and "repetitive behavior" such as inability to take unplanned behavior.To varying degrees, the symptoms are manifested throughout life, so there is a strong social need to elucidate the causes for the discovery of therapies that alleviate the symptoms of autism.

 It has been known that in autistic patients, "duplicate abnormalities" occur frequently on chromosome 15 and the neurotransmitter "serotonin" in the brain is reduced. It was unclear if it would lead to autism.

 Analysis using model mice showing the same genomic abnormality as human chromosome 15 duplication revealed that the function of the "Raphe nuclei of the midbrain", which is the source of serotonin, was reduced, and that the serotonin nerve was projected to the group. We found that a certain "cerebral cortex" had an abnormal response to sensory stimuli.
Furthermore, when the amount of serotonin in the brain was restored during the developmental stage of the model mouse, the above two abnormalities improved.It is said that this serotonin therapy also improved the social behavioral abnormalities of model mice.

 This result is expected to bring new findings related to the treatment of autism.

Paper information:[Science Advances] Serotonin rebalances cortical tuning and behavior linked to autism symptoms in 15q11-13 CNV mice

Nippon Medical School

"Tradition" of Nippon Medical School ✕ "Technology Revolution for Medical University" started

Nippon Medical School is Japan's oldest private medical university, more than 147 years old. Under the educational philosophy of "cultivating high-quality doctors and medical scientists with love and research spirit," we are developing medical professionals who have solid medical knowledge and skills, as well as abundant humanity.With the progress of globalization of medical care, 2014 […] ahead of universities nationwide

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