Current Research into Autism Spectrum Disorder

[MUSIC PLAYING]

REPORTER (VOICEOVER): They're three all-American boys, all of them smart.

BOY 1: I like to draw, read books.

REPORTER (VOICEOVER): Likable.

REPORTER: Tell me your name.

BOY 2: Benjamin Morris Fink.

REPORTER: OK. Benjamin Morris Fink.

BOY 2: Just call me Ben.

REPORTER: Just call you Ben.

REPORTER (VOICEOVER): And autistic.

WOMAN: Thank you.

REPORTER (VOICEOVER): Autism is a brain disorder, typically diagnosed when a child is two or three. And among Americans, it has skyrocketed 600% over the last two decades. From one in 1,500 kids in the 1990s, to one in 110 kids today. And one in 70 boys. Doctor Geraldine Dawson is chief science officer for Autism Speaks, the world's leading autism advocacy group.

WOMAN 2: So we know that the numbers are increasing. It's really staggering. And we're still trying to understand why.

REPORTER (VOICEOVER): And with autism, the need dwarfs the US government's response. It spends less than $300 million a year on autism research and services. And yet the cost of those services and care is $35 billion. The problem with autism, is no one knows for sure why it's increasing.

REPORTER: Like autistic kids, researchers are taking in a lot of information. The challenge, is making sense of it all. So far, they've been able to collect the dots. They just can't seem to connect the dots.

WOMAN 3: How old are you?

[CHILD VOCALIZES]

REPORTER (VOICEOVER): Autism experts say it's not just one disease, but many, largely genetic, with possible environmental triggers, such as toxins or pesticides, and still largely a mystery. Autistic people fall on a spectrum of symptoms and severity.

WOMAN 2: What's common among all those individuals, is that difficulty in the area of social interaction. As a toddler, Brennen Henderson babbled, but wouldn't talk, and had frightening tantrums. Adam Peterson was easily rattled, a case of endless crying over spilled milk.

WOMAN: His initial response is anxiety. Oh my gosh, something didn't happen the way it was supposed to happen.

REPORTER (VOICEOVER): Socially, all autistic kids like Ben Fink, have trouble connecting.

MAN: He wants to interact with kids, but he doesn't quite know how.

REPORTER (VOICEOVER): Through therapy, all three boys have made great strides. But almost all parents of autistic kids struggle to find help and to understand the disease.

WOMAN: Everybody has opinions, but there is no course of treatment. There is no standard of care. And as it is now, we are putting things together with duct tape and spit.

REPORTER (VOICEOVER): Part of the solution may come here at Children's Hospital of Philadelphia. This lab is testing the DNA of autism in a revolutionary way. Doctor Hakon Hakonarson is the hospital's director of the Center of Applied Genomics. He has found 2/3 of autistic people share a certain gene mutation.

MAN 2: If I was able to fix this gene or eliminate it, how many autism cases would then go away. Well, that is as high as 15%, 1-5, 15% of cases.

REPORTER (VOICEOVER): In the same hospital, Ben Fink and Adam Peterson are both part of more cutting-edge research. For Ben, it's magnetic resonance imaging done on his brain's wiring—its fiber pathways. Autistic brains don't make needed connections, and Doctor Robert Schultz, the director of the Center for Autism Research, is asking why.

MAN 3: We're all trying to figure out, where are the connections the most different from a typically developing child? And Ben falls right into the pattern that we would expect.

REPORTER (VOICEOVER): This screen shows typical kids. The red hot spots indicate their brains responding to social interaction. On Ben's scan, there are no red spots. Often the case with autistic children.

BOY 2: Feels kind of funny.

REPORTER (VOICEOVER): In another wing of the hospital, Adam Peterson is part of a different study on how quickly the brain processes sound. Doctor Tim Roberts says the brains of eight of every 10 autistic kids respond to a sound as simple as a beep one hundredth of a second late.

REPORTER: For example, this conversation, they would be 10 words behind us, or longer.

MAN 4: Suddenly they would find that complex conversations, these delays would add up and cascade, if you like.

REPORTER (VOICEOVER): This could be the first imaging biomarker ever to predict autism, potentially in the first year of life. And at the University of North Carolina, the Henderson family is involved in another study. Not Brennan, but his one-year-old brother, Samuel.

WOMAN 4: My gut says that there might be something going on, but it's too early to know decisively.

REPORTER (VOICEOVER): Siblings of autistic kids have a 20% greater chance of autism, themselves. This infant brain imaging study is focusing on brain changes starting at six months, especially brain enlargement, typical of many autistic kids. Doctor Joe Piven is the director of the Carolina Institute for Developmental Disabilities.

MAN 5: It gives us some hope that we can begin to focus on this window of opportunity before that brain enlargement, or before that onset of the autistic behavior.

BOY 2: Hi mom.

WOMAN: What are you doing?

REPORTER (VOICEOVER): And until science provides the answer, parents like Donna Henderson hope for a cure.

WOMAN: If someone told me that I could go to Antarctica and hike up to the highest mountain and there would be a shaman up there with the cure, if I know that was right, I'd be packing up the dogsled.

MAN 6: One of the things that a human being can't live without, is hope. We hold on to hope, because that's what gets us through.