title: Serum neurotrophin concentrations in autism and mental retardation: a pilot study.
abstract: To evaluate the availability of the serum neurotrophins for the diagnosis of the patients with neurodevelopmental disorder, we measured the serum concentration of brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF) and neurotrophin-4 (NT-4) in the patients diagnosed with autism (n=18) and mental retardation (n=20), or healthy controls (n=16), using enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay. There tended to be a higher concentration of serum BDNF found in the autistic group ( P <0.05 by analysis of variance (ANOVA)) and the mental retardation group ( P <0.001 by ANOVA) compared to the control group. Serum NT-4 concentration tended to be increased in the mental retardation group (P <0.05 by ANOVA). We conclude that measuring the serum concentration of two neurotrophins, BDNF and NT-4, might be helpful to diagnose or classify disorders such as autism or mental retardation.
authors.affiliation: Neurobiology Laboratory, Institute of Basic Medical Sciences, University of Tsukuba, 1-1-1 Tennodai, Tsukuba, Ibaraki 305-8575, Japan.
authors.forename: Kaoru
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Miyazaki
authors.forename: Naoko
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Narita
authors.forename: Ryoichi
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Sakuta
authors.forename: Tomoko
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Miyahara
authors.forename: Hiroshi
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Naruse
authors.forename: Nobuo
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Okado
authors.forename: Masaaki
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Narita
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D001321:Autistic Disorder / Q000097:blood*; D015415:Biomarkers; D019208:Brain-Derived Neurotrophic Factor / Q000097:blood; D002648:Child; D002675:Child, Preschool; D004797:Enzyme-Linked Immunosorbent Assay; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007223:Infant; D008607:Intellectual Disability / Q000097:blood*; D008297:Male; D009414:Nerve Growth Factors / Q000097:blood*; D010865:Pilot Projects
chemical_list: D015415:Biomarkers; D019208:Brain-Derived Neurotrophic Factor; D009414:Nerve Growth Factors; C073922:neurotrophin 4