The way tiny strands of connected brain tissue behave could yield important new clues to autism and other poorly understood brain disorders, a University of Louisville neuroscientist has found.

The strands, which radiate across the part of the brain associated with higher functions such as language and abstract thought, operate differently in the brains of autistic people and normal people, said psychiatry researcher Manuel Casanova.

A research paper on the finding appears this month in the journal Cerebral Cortex.

Casanova's team found that the strands and the neurons in between them vary in size, spacing and density - all characteristics that can be studied by scientists trying to better understand autism, dyslexia and other brain disorders.

"We found that some 600 million of these brain strands begin forming in the cortex in the earliest stages of life," Casanova said.

The researchers examined brain tissue from donors ranging in age from 10 weeks of gestation to 98 years old. By measuring the samples, they created a model for predicting the growth rate of the strands before and after birth, a tool that could be used to pinpoint the origins and timing of brain abnormalities as they develop.

They also found that the strands in a baby's cerebral cortex begin to grow rapidly after birth, a phenomenon that physically explains the ability of infants to learn quickly.

TO THE NEWS MEDIA: The complete research study by Casanova's team appears here.