Child mutations stem from paternal side, landmark study shows
Babies of older fathers are more likely to carry genetic mutations than those of younger fathers.
And the mutations could lead to illnesses such as autism and schizophrenia in later life, a landmark study has shown.
Scientists have, for the first time, counted the number of new mutations linked with a father’s age at the time of conception and have concluded that older men are significantly more likely to have children with potentially harmful genetic changes.
The results could explain previous studies showing that certain mental and developmental illnesses with strong genetic components tend to be more common among people whose fathers were older at the time of conception.
Although the age of a child’s mother has been linked with problems associated with chromosomal defects, such as Down’s syndrome, there has been scant information about the contribution made by older fathers to the future health of their offspring.
“These observations shed light on the importance of the father’s age on the risk of diseases such as schizophrenia and autism,” the researchers say in their study published in the journal Nature. The scientists found that a new-born baby’s genome contains around 60 new small-scale mutations compared with its parents and that the actual number of new mutations carried by each child was strongly dependent on the age of the father, rather than the mother, at the time of conception.
They are still grasping at straws trying to *blame* autism on something/somebody.
Some of us with Autistic Spectrum Disorders (notably Asperger’s Syndrome) realize that (A) it is not a problem – it is just a difference, (B) the proximal cause is simply a variation in the architecture of the brain’s circuitry similar to that found in schizophrenia, (C) the cause of the variation could be *natural* genetic variation, developmental, environmental, or (most likely) a combination of these, and (D) the exact causes and the appropriate methods of dealing with the differences wil not be identified until the medical data miners abandon the identification of “risk factors” and the consequent convergence upon fallacies of accident.
CORRELATION IS NOT CAUSATION.
Indeed tadchem although this has one element of biological plausibility as regards mechanism – they have determined an increased number of mutations in spermatozoa as compared with ova with older parents. While certainly not definitive it is better than a lot of efforts. For that reason if no other I’m inclined to cut them at least some slack.
Tad, “A” is hitting the nail on the head. In fact, for the majority of people with Aspergers, special treatment is the worst that you can do to “help” them. Any coddling and excuse to not be social merely inhibits development. Worse are attempts to force socialization. It’s a bit of a bigger problem when both parents also have the “disorder” because the social problems aren’t significantly noticeable until full-time school hits. As frustrating as it may be, your best choice is to just leave them be, let them flounder for a little while in elementary school. The robotics team and chess club will welcome them in high school and then it’s a lifetime of engineering and geekery awaiting them in the future.
Said from firsthand experience.
Live long and prosper, y’all.
In line with tadchem, you can “reduce” the number of autism cases by removing Asperger’s from the number, and also by redefining the symptoms needed for the diagnosis. Originally, autism was a disabling condition with few diagnosed with it. As more and more medications and money for disabilities became available, the criteria became larger and larger. I am in no way saying there are not children who suffer from severe autism that need help and a way to prevent those severe cases. But so many of these psych diagnoses are a bunch of symptoms that can be manipulated to increase the number of cases. Often, it’s just a name so that a set of symptoms looks like a “legitimate” disease. A set of symptoms is a really crappy way to define disease. Look how we now have meds to make more eye lashes, pee less, etc, etc. If we stuck to the most severe cases, one has to suspect that better and more effective research would be done.
I should have been more specific: A set of vague symptoms that can apply to many different illnesses with the diagnoses being made more as an art form than a scientific method is a crappy way to define an illness. This is the method used with “mental” illness (which is a huge misnomer since there is supposed to be a biological cause. If it’s biological, it’s an illness, even if it affects moods and behaviors. Tourette’s is an illness, not a mental illness.) If these things are biological in nature, a firm set of symptoms not common to half the population need to exist and the term “illness” must apply. No more talk of mental illness.
The sample size is 78 and all from Iceland. No offense intended to the Icelanders, but isn’t their gene pool size rather limited to start with? Add a tiny sample size and do we have a valid study? or just another bunch of worthless noise? Seem like from what I learn on the “Junk Science Quiz” that the sample size alone is enough to toss out the study.
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