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Huge autism genome project returns empty handed. ZERO

natasa778

Senior Member
Messages
1,774
http://spittoon.23andme.com/health-2/autism-study-reveals-no-genetic-associations/
Autism Study Reveals No Genetic Associations

Their study, known as the Autism Genome Project (AGP), was conducted in two stages. The first stage of consisted of a genome-wide association study using genetic data from 1400 families affected by autism; the second stage checked the associations discovered in the first stage using the genetic data from an additional 1301 ASD-affected families and included another new genome-wide association study which combined the study subjects from both stages.

... When all the analyses were said and done, no SNPs (common genetic variations) were significantly associated with ASD. Furthermore, when some of the SNPs that had been identified in the first study as possibly associated with ASD were tested in the second-stage families, the associations failed to hold up. This lack of common SNPs associated with ASD is both disappointing and enlightening.
Knowledge of what is not true, paradoxically, is knowledge of what is true. For instance, if I tell you that my pet Tyger is not a dog, you are one step closer to knowing Tyger’s a cat. Most of science progresses through “not trues” — the failed hypotheses that bring us closer to real understanding. A perfect example of this mode of scientific progress is this recent genetic study. Their lack of findings was quite a finding.

I beg to disagree. Their lack of findings was totally to be expected (everyone who wanted to look with open eyes could see that Tyger wasn't a dog!!) and was just a massive waste of research funds. To think that all this money and energy could have been spent in cracking pathology and streamlining treatments! Argghhhh.
 

adreno

PR activist
Messages
4,841
I found this highly interesting. Why do you think it was a waste of time and money, and why was the result "totally to be expected"?
 

peggy-sue

Senior Member
Messages
2,623
Location
Scotland
I find it very interesting too. And it is not until such a study is conducted that you can actually say, with certainty, the results show what was to be "totally expected".

Now YOU can say, with proper reference, and proof that there are no genetic associations.
It is no longer speculation.

(once it's been properly replicated by others etc.)
 

natasa778

Senior Member
Messages
1,774
I find it very interesting too. And it is not until such a study is conducted that you can actually say, with certainty, the results show what was to be "totally expected".

Now YOU can say, with proper reference, and proof that there are no genetic associations.
It is no longer speculation.

Aaah, the problem here is limited research funds. If you only have say 10million to spend, do you spend 9.9 million to prove with certainty what should be obvious anyway??
 

alex3619

Senior Member
Messages
13,810
Location
Logan, Queensland, Australia
Because it has always been bleeding obvious that environmental factors are behind the epidemics.

Hi natasa778, while I agree it should have been obvious, it wasn't to everyone. The genetic hypothesis was, and possibly still is despite this study (its not replicated and they might come up with reasons why the study failed), held up by many in the medical establishment as the most likely.

The effort to prevent any disease from being seen as environmental is huge. I am writing a blog on this that I hope to post next week. The movement to discredit environmental factors as causal is well funded, widespread, multinational and recruits large numbers of doctors.

Bye, Alex
 

searcher

Senior Member
Messages
567
Location
SF Bay Area
I think the environment is a big contributor to autism, but I would have predicted that the researchers would find SNPs that made some children more likely to be affected by environmental triggers.
 

anciendaze

Senior Member
Messages
1,841
You might check on what has turned up in genetic research on mental illnesses like schizophrenia. Despite the findings, repeated in more textbooks than I could name, that concordance between homozygous twins is about 25% for schizophrenia no clear association turned up until a lineage was found with a disruption in a gene designated DISC1. Unfortunately for psychiatric diagnosis, the members of the family inheriting that defective gene suffered from one of three distinct serious mental illnesses: schizophrenia, major depressive disorders and bipolar illness. The gene was not specific to schizophrenia at all.

Further genetic studies found other such lineages with no recent ancestor in common with the Scottish lineage as far away as Japan and China. Studies of diagnosed schizophrenics went through as many as 600 without finding a single schizophrenic showing the putative causative defective gene. The vast majority of cases are not caused by this gene.

Meanwhile, laboratory research on knockout mice with this defective gene went on showing it caused numerous neurological developmental problems. Where did they get mice with the same deletion? You can trace this back to a retrovirus active in mice. There are multiple lineages of such mice without a recent common ancestor. This is an example of an inherited defect induced by environmental factors.

In the case of human mothers infected with HTLV-1 we know that 20% of children are infected while nursing. Those with exactly the same genome would share vulnerabilities other siblings lack, leading to clinical diagnosis of the same condition. If researchers didn't start off knowing that there are no other active retroviruses in humans (except HIV) the parallels would be striking.
 

natasa778

Senior Member
Messages
1,774
You might check on what has turned up in genetic research on mental illnesses like schizophrenia. Despite the findings, repeated in more textbooks than I could name, that concordance between homozygous twins is about 25% for schizophrenia no clear association turned up until a lineage was found with a disruption in a gene designated DISC1. Unfortunately for psychiatric diagnosis, the members of the family inheriting that defective gene suffered from one of three distinct serious mental illnesses: schizophrenia, major depressive disorders and bipolar illness. The gene was not specific to schizophrenia at all.

Further genetic studies found other such lineages with no recent ancestor in common with the Scottish lineage as far away as Japan and China. Studies of diagnosed schizophrenics went through as many as 600 without finding a single schizophrenic showing the putative causative defective gene. The vast majority of cases are not caused by this gene.

Meanwhile, laboratory research on knockout mice with this defective gene went on showing it caused numerous neurological developmental problems. Where did they get mice with the same deletion? You can trace this back to a retrovirus active in mice. There are multiple lineages of such mice without a recent common ancestor. This is an example of an inherited defect induced by environmental factors.

In the case of human mothers infected with HTLV-1 we know that 20% of children are infected while nursing. Those with exactly the same genome would share vulnerabilities other siblings lack, leading to clinical diagnosis of the same condition. If researchers didn't start off knowing that there are no other active retroviruses in humans (except HIV) the parallels would be striking.

Couldn't agree more. Especially since symptoms and pathologies of 'Paediatric NeuroAIDS' in HIV+ untreated children are in most ways identical to those in idiopatic autism.
 

alex3619

Senior Member
Messages
13,810
Location
Logan, Queensland, Australia
I do agree that its unusual that no snp associations were found - even by chance you would expect some. I wonder if two things might not account for that. ASD is much more diverse genetically than they had thought, and hence there were no associations. This would be a bit like looking for A CAUSE for all chronic fatigue and then concluding that there is no cause for ME.

However a snp or combination of snps will only increase risk factors. Environmental impact is very important. We know that from the rise in incidence of autism from migrants.

In order to identify subgroups and research snps they would need to do two things. First, identify potential environmental triggers and subgroup accordingly. Second, identify common symptom clusters and subgroup accordingly.

The point Natasa778 was making, I think, is that without subgrouping you can't find good associations in a highly heterogenous condition.This same problem plagues CF research - particularly under the Oxford CF definition (I don't feel it deserves an -S on the end).

Bye, Alex
 

natasa778

Senior Member
Messages
1,774
The point Natasa778 was making, I think, is that without subgrouping you can't find good associations in a highly heterogenous condition.This same problem plagues CF research - particularly under the Oxford CF definition (I don't feel it deserves an -S on the end).

Yes. But especially important the point you made that "a snp or combination of snps will only increase risk factors."

In the context of here and now of autism (and probably most other diseases) the genetic factors that increase the risk, if there are any, are still practically useless. i.e. even if you know what they were they still would not stop the epidemic nor would that knowledge help much in terms of treatments. If the research funds were limitless then yes please, all details are good to know, but to say that disproportionate amount of funding has gone into genetic research would be an understatement of the century.

To illustrate this point: some CCR polymorphisms seem to make people more vulnerable to developing AIDS (including neuroAIDS!), and some genetic polymorphisms seem to make some individuals more resistant, but in the end it is HIV and not the genetic risk factors that give you AIDS. If the science of HIV was in the same dogmatic dead-end as autism "science" there would be no ARVs, epidemic would still be spreading like mad, people would be dying in droves, while the "experts" would be yapping on about the need to pin down all the genetic risk factors bla bla.

Genetic heritability and shared environmental factors among twin pairs with autism
 

natasa778

Senior Member
Messages
1,774
Btw while on the subject of genetic heritability, there was an excellent article in 18 August issue of the Economist magazine

Microbe maketh man

Amongst many interesting things these quotes stand out:


“…The other field that may be changed is genetics. Many of the diseases in which the microbiome is implicated seem to run in families. In some, such as heart disease, that is partly explained by known human genes. In a lot, though, most notably autism, the genetic link is obscure. This may be because geneticists have been looking at the wrong set of genes—the 23,000 rather than the 3m. For those 3m are still inherited. They are largely picked up from your mother during the messy process of birth. Though no clear example is yet known, it is possible that particular disease-inducing strains are being passed down the generations in this way…

… Though less reliably so than the genes in egg and sperm, microbiomes,
too, can be inherited. Many bugs are picked up directly from the mother
at birth. Others arrive shortly afterwards from the immediate
environment. It is possible, therefore, that apparently genetic diseases
whose causative genes cannot be located really are heritable, but that
the genes which cause them are bacterial.
(imo they are forgetting to add ‘or viral’ at the end :) )
 

Dufresne

almost there...
Messages
1,039
Location
Laurentians, Quebec
I've often wondered why medical authorities haven't looked at the prevalence of autism among Christian Scientists. We already know there is virtually no autism in the Amish community. This could be the matter of a lack of vaccination, environmental chemicals, EMF, or predisposing genetics. To discover the incidence among Christian Scientists would at least answer the vaccination question, as these folks live as the bulk of civilization does except for the medical intervention. They're also a far more genetically diverse people than the Amish so that argument against a positive finding could not be used.

How much would it cost to contact the heads of Christian Scientist churches across the US to get an idea? I don't know what I believe concerning vaccination and autism, but the simplicity and financial ease with which this question could be answered and yet still isn't is further reason to doubt the CDC, in my mind.
 

SOC

Senior Member
Messages
7,849
I've often wondered why medical authorities haven't looked at the prevalence of autism among Christian Scientists. We already know there is virtually no autism in the Amish community. This could be the matter of a lack of vaccination, environmental chemicals, EMF, or predisposing genetics. To discover the incidence among Christian Scientists would at least answer the vaccination question, as these folks live as the bulk of civilization does except for the medical intervention. They're also a far more genetically diverse people than the Amish so that argument against a positive finding could not be used.

How much would it cost to contact the heads of Christian Scientist churches across the US to get an idea? I don't know what I believe concerning vaccination and autism, but the simplicity and financial ease with which this question could be answered and yet still isn't is further reason to doubt the CDC, in my mind.

Interesting idea, but having been raised a Christian Scientist and being related to many Christian Scientists, I can tell you that it wouldn't be easy to get volunteers. It's not that they would be particularly opposed so much as just not interested in being involved in medical research.

It is interesting though, that among all the many Christian Scientists I know, not one was autistic -- meaning none of the adults or any of their children. That isn't to say that they don't exist, I just haven't met any.

You're right though, if you could get a big enough sample, they would be a good group to study -- no vaccinations or other medical care, but otherwise typical of the rest of the population.
 

taniaaust1

Senior Member
Messages
13,054
Location
Sth Australia
I've often wondered why medical authorities haven't looked at the prevalence of autism among Christian Scientists. We already know there is virtually no autism in the Amish community. This could be the matter of a lack of vaccination, environmental chemicals, EMF, or predisposing genetics. To discover the incidence among Christian Scientists would at least answer the vaccination question, as these folks live as the bulk of civilization does except for the medical intervention. They're also a far more genetically diverse people than the Amish so that argument against a positive finding could not be used.

How much would it cost to contact the heads of Christian Scientist churches across the US to get an idea? I don't know what I believe concerning vaccination and autism, but the simplicity and financial ease with which this question could be answered and yet still isn't is further reason to doubt the CDC, in my mind.

Im sure vaccination does cause autism.. as I know of a clear case in which it did.. the baby as a normal smiley baby who was nothing out of the norm eg able to make eye contact etc before vaccination... me and his mum had many discussions over vaccination as she want sure to go ahead with vaccination or not.. she thou decided to do the normal thing and do it as the odds of vaccination causing major issues werent high.

After vaccination.. that baby never smiled again and would look right throu people, wasnt interested in people anymore and couldnt make eye contact He ended up being diagnosed as quite severely autistic. Due to this I have no doubts vaccinations "may" cause autism.

Then there is the Asperger's (which is a mild form of autism) which runs in my family (dad, me and my daughter who has it far worst then I. She had one to one right throu primary school as she didnt behave normally).. my daughter NEVER had vaccination as I was anti vaccination after a bad reaction my first child go to one (she seemed to catch the very thing the vaccination was supposed to protect her from and doctors didnt know what to make of this.. if she was contagious or what). So with my second child.. no way was she going to have vaccination.. Thing is.. my unvaccinated child still ended up with Aspergers (while my child who did have some vaccinations doesnt have Aspergers)...

The Aspergers traits were there from the start.. (from only days old I noticed my baby was different to normal but just had thought at first it was something to do with her personality, I just couldnt have known at that time it was Aspergers). She was thou obviously Aspergers by a few years old.