Brain scans may be able to detect signs of ASD in infancy

Early brain changes may help predict autism spectrum disorders (ASD) in high-risk children, a new study reports. 

Heather Cody Hazlett and colleagues performed MRI scans on 106 high-risk infants whose older siblings had an ASD diagnosis. (Children with an older sibling with ASD have a 1-in-5 chance of developing ASD themselves.) In addition, they performed scans on 42 low-risk infants. The researchers scanned the children’s brains at 6, 12, and 24 months of age. 

Fifteen of the children in the high-risk group received an ASD diagnosis by the age of 24 months. MRI scans showed that the volume of these children’s brains grew faster between 12 and 24 months than the brains of children who did not develop ASD, and that behavioral symptoms began to appear during this period of accelerated growth. In addition, the cortical surface area grew faster between 6 and 12 months in children later diagnosed with autism. 

The researchers then used a computer-generated algorithm to predict autism based primarily on brain surface area information from the MRIs of 6- to 12-month-old children. They say this algorithm “predicted the diagnosis of autism in individual high-risk children at 24 months (with a positive predictive value of 81% and a sensitivity of 88%).” 

Study coauthor Joseph Piven says, “This finding suggests that in the future, early brain imaging may be able to predict later autism risk and identify those infants who might benefit the most from intensive interventions before the symptoms emerge, and during a time when the brain is most malleable.” The researchers note, however, that their findings need to be replicated in a larger set of children.

Citations

“Early brain development in infants at high risk for autism spectrum disorder,” Heather Cody Hazlett, Hongbin Gu, Brent C. Munsell, Sun Hyung Kim, Martin Styner, Jason J. Wolff, Jed T. Elison, Meghan R. Swanson, Hongtu Zhu, Kelly N. Botteron, D. Louis Collins, John N. Constantino, Stephen R. Dager, Annette M. Estes, Alan C. Evans, Vladimir S. Fonov, Guido Gerig, Penelope Kostopoulos, Robert C. McKinstry, Juhi Pandey, Sarah Paterson, John R. Pruett, Robert T. Schultz, Dennis W. Shaw, Lonnie Zwaigenbaum, Joseph Piven, and the IBIS Network; Nature, February 15, 2017 (online). Address: Heather Cody Hazlett, [email protected]. 

—and— 

“Experimental test can spot autism in infancy,” HealthDay, February 15, 2017.