Toronto, Ontario, Canada = Four families are the first to learn that
their child's autism is due to a chromosomal error ... a missing short
string of DNA on a specific region of the 16th chromosome.About 400
families are involved in a longterm study here. Only 1 of the 4
inherited this from a parent. As many as 100 genes could be involved
or work in combination to cause autism, so researchers continue to
plumb the genome. The mutation discovered on this chromosome was also
identified by two other research groups. The team states this is a
complex disorder but they hope to to find further markers for autism.
The results of this study were published January 17th, 2008, in the
American Journal of Human Genetics.