Page 1 of 1 [ 2 posts ] 

Jeremythedude
Butterfly
Butterfly

Joined: 7 Oct 2017
Gender: Male
Posts: 16

11 Feb 2018, 1:23 pm

Apparently the cause of Autism/Aspergers is he lack of pruning in the brain at a young age meaning some synapses aren't eliminated which results in too many synapses . I read about a immunosuppresive drug called Rapamycin that was used on a mouse and resulted in less autism like behavior meaning it restored normal synaptic pruning. What do you guys think?



Exuvian
Veteran
Veteran

User avatar

Joined: 16 Aug 2016
Age: 44
Gender: Male
Posts: 822

11 Feb 2018, 9:20 pm

The idea behind synaptic pruning is sort of like removing the 'side roads' & 'scenic routes' of the brain in favor of the more utilitarian roads more traveled, right? Or, an optimization process.

So this implies autistic brains are more inter-connected, but less efficient overall. That could be true. I wonder what benefits and disadvantages this experiment would have in a human brain.