Using Zebrafish to Decipher the Roles of Genes Associated With Autism

 

With the end goal of recognizing the qualities in question and developing medicines for human mind issues, such as chemical imbalance, scientists have adopted another strategy. Using zebrafish, the researchers looked at a group of about two dozen genes that are either missing or duplicated in about 1% of autistic people. They found that almost all of these genes caused abnormalities in the brain when they were deleted in zebrafish embryos. 

Fish cannot exhibit the symptoms of human brain disorders like autism, schizophrenia, or others. Nonetheless, a group of M I-T researchers has shown that zebrafish can be a valuable device for concentrating on the qualities that contribute to such problems. 

The group of researchers, led by developmental biologist Hazel S I-V E, set out to investigate a group of about two dozen genes that are thought to be missing or duplicated in about 1% of autistic patients. The MIT study revealed that nearly all the genes had unknown functions, but when deleted in zebrafish embryos, nearly all of them resulted in abnormalities in the brain. 

According to him, an associate dean of M I-T School of Science and a professor of biology, the findings should help researchers locate genes that require further investigation in mammals. It is thought that a number of genetic defects are to blame for autism. This research is part of a larger effort to find the genes that are to blame and create treatments that target those genes. 

According to him, who is also a member of the Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research, "that's really the goal—to go from an animal that shares molecular pathways but doesn't get autistic behaviors into humans who have the same pathways and do show these behaviors". 

In a recent article published in the online version of the journal Disease Models, S I- V E and her colleagues presented their findings. Whitehead postdocs Alicia B L A-K E-R Lee, Sunny Gupta, and Jasmine M C Common are the paper's lead authors

A Logical Starting Point

Because most of the symptoms of brain disorders are behavioral, it is hard to study them. A genetic region known as 16p11.2 was first identified by Mark D-A L Y and studied by S-I V-E and her colleagues. Pathology can be linked to copy number variants, which occur when one of those copies is deleted or duplicated. Researchers have discovered that the brain's 16p11.2 gene region plays a significant role in brain development. Most cancellations and duplications in this district have been related to mental imbalance. By injecting fish with the human counterparts of the repressed genes, researchers were able to restore normal development

Genes With Impact

Two genes that control how much of a particular protein is made have been identified by MIT researchers. These qualities are related to unusual advancement when their movement is diminished by 50%. S U G U O asserts that the study broadens our understanding of zebrafish brain development

He, who was not involved in this study, says, "This is really nice work that shows the importance of zebrafish in revealing disease mechanisms related to human mental disorders, in this case autism". 

In work that has recently started, S-I V-E lab is working with Stanford College analysts to investigate mouse expectations produced using the zebrafish study. In addition, they are conducting molecular studies of the pathways affected by these genes in zebrafish to gain a better understanding of how this gene's defects might result in neurological disorders