International Federation of Gynecology and Obstetrics

Maternal and newborn health research has found links between prenatal development and autism.

A team led by Eric Courchesne of the University of San Diego School of Medicine Autism Center of Excellence in the US conducted post-mortem examinations on 13 boys between two and 16 years old.

Six of the subjects were developing in a manner typical to their age when they died, while seven had autism.

The scientists discovered boys with the neurological disorder had heavier brains than their peers and 67 per cent more neurons in the prefrontal cortex, which deals with functions autistic children tend to have trouble with like social behaviour, attention, language, communication and mood.

It was suggested the abnormalities could be caused by a fault with apoptosis - the process of cell death - which should begin in the final stages of pregnancy and early infancy.

The authors, whose findings were published in Journal of the American Medical Association, also said it was possible that defects in cell birth and maintenance could be involved.

It was recently noted in a University of California, San Francisco-led study that giving newborns certain types of steroid can impair their brain development.

Posted by Paul Robertson