title: Genetics of autism spectrum disorders.
abstract: Autism is a group of etiology and clinical heterogeneous neurodevelopmental disorders with an onset before 3 years old. It has 3 core characteristics: deficits in verbal communication; impairment of social interaction; restricted interests and repetitive behaviors. The incidence is increasing over time worldwide. Twin and family studies have demonstrated that autism has a high heritability (>90%). Although certain progress of autism genetic study has been made in the last decades and several autism susceptibility genes and loci have been identified, there are still about 70%-80% of patients for whom an autism-related genetic change cannot be identified.
authors.affiliation: Central South University, Changsha 410078,China.
authors.forename: Hui
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Guo
authors.forename: Zhengmao
authors.initials: Z
authors.lastname: Hu
authors.forename: Jingping
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Zhao
authors.forename: Kun
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Xia
mesh_terms: D001321:Autistic Disorder / Q000235:genetics*; D002675:Child, Preschool; D057890:Epigenomics; D018740:Genetic Heterogeneity; D006801:Humans; D007223:Infant