Scientists still do not know what underpins the core behavioural characteristics of autism, for example repetitive behaviours. One well-supported theory suggests that these behaviours stem from an imbalance between neurotransmitters (the ’chemical messengers’ in the...

AIMS-2-TRIALS researchers have been exploring how people process faces, both in autistic and non-autistic individuals. Previous research has shown that most people find it trickier to recognise upside down (inverted) faces compared to upright faces (see image on the...

AIMS-2-TRIALS researchers, as part of a large-scale collaboration in the Longitudinal European Autism Project (LEAP), have been studying the variability within autism. In a large study of over 400 children and adults, the team have found that the timing of the N170 –...

Research studies across the lifespan Project updates:  Over the past year, recruitment of participants and families to our AIMS-2-TRIALS cohort studies has grown at its most significant rate since pandemic-related restrictions on face-to-face research eased. The Leads...

Everyone experiences the world differently and faces different challenges. Some autistic people may want support with difficulties in areas such as sleep, social interaction, sensory difficulties, irritability, or depression, while others may not. Currently, no...

Much remains unknown about the biology and genetics of autism, although researchers have shown that it is heritable and there are many genes linked to its development. One unique approach to discovering more is to study rare genetic conditions that often co-occur with...

Infants with more of the genetic differences related to autism were found to respond to faces differently, even at a very young age, before signs of autism might be noticeable.Many thanks to Birkbeck for allowing us to reprint this article about AIMS-2-TRIALS...

AIMS-2-TRIALS researchers are working alongside autistic people to develop technology that objectively measures aspects of their experience. Wearable devices, such as smart watches, can include sensors to record information like heart rate and skin conductivity and...

Innovation Radar is a European Commission initiative to identify innovations and innovators in EU-funded research. AIMS-2-TRIALS recently submitted several important developments to the scheme, receiving positive feedback and inclusion within the Innovation Radar...

New AIMS-2-TRIALS research finds that autistic people with more social communication difficulties have different brain connectivity compared to autistic people with an equal mix of social traits and repetitive behaviours. Background A diagnosis of autism includes the...

Listen to AIMS-2-TRIALS researcher Professor Emily Jones talk about her work on theta waves and information processing on the PsychologiCall podcast. During this podcast she talks about her research looking at how changes in early brain activity may predict later...

Autistic children can have differing preferences for social stimuli such as faces compared to non-social stimuli, and research suggests that differences in brain activity could underlie this and be predictive of later autism. A team of researchers including Dr Anna...

Autistic people have long made the case that they should be involved in research about them and many researchers now consider this to be part of the standard research process. This involvement is sometimes referred to as ‘participatory research’ and can be done in a...

Many autistic people will tell you they have struggled to access a service, or perhaps more than one, whether that be health or social care, employment support, financial assistance, an educational programme, or one of many others. But policymakers can’t commission...

Around three times as many males are diagnosed with autism than females, which suggests that sex-related biological factors play a key role in its development. However, little is known about the ways that autistic males and females differ in terms of brain structure...

A world-leading AIMS-2-TRIALS team at the Institut Pasteur (Paris) has developed a secure database to address the needs of the AIMS-2-TRIALS project, ensuring that large, multidisciplinary datasets from participants across Europe are secure, GDPR compliant and easily...

AIMS-2-TRIALS researchers from King’s College London have revealed that reduced flexible behaviour in autistic people is underpinned by different dominant learning mechanisms across development, and less optimal learning. Background Flexible behaviour is critical for...

Genetic instructions in our DNA are able to build a human from scratch and no two human beings are perfectly identical; we differ in our height, eye color, how we look, think, feel and act. Scientists know that differences in our DNA code explain some of these...

Understanding individual differences in early brain development can help predict long-term outcomes in children who are later found to be autistic. Because children’s brains develop rapidly, measurements need to focus on factors that are relatively stable, rather than...

Professor Emily Jones of Birkbeck University, London was featured on an episode of the Association for Child & Adolescent Mental Health (ACAMH) Podcast discussing the brain, early development, and autism.

Placebos, such as sugar pills or saline injections, are designed to have no direct effects, yet treatment with placebo can substantially improve symptoms across many conditions. This is called a placebo response or placebo effect. Researchers often compare results for...

Research partners of AIMS-2-TRIALS from Birkbeck University, London have published a paper exploring how a process called DNA methylation plays a role in autism. DNA methylation is a naturally occurring process that happens in all people to different degrees. During...

'Quality of life’ is the satisfaction or general wellbeing that each individual experiences in different aspects of their everyday life, such as their health, education, employment and social relationships. Past research studies have suggested that, on average,...

AIMS-2-TRIALS partner and Autism Champion Dr. Joaquin Fuentes, and colleagues Dr. Amaia Hervás and Dr. Patricia Howlin have released a new open-access publication: "ESCAP practice guidance for autism: a summary of evidence-based recommendations for diagnosis and...

New research led by King’s College London has provided insight into why exposure to inflammation caused by a viral infection during pregnancy may increase the likelihood of altered brain development later on in childhood.Many thanks to KCL for their permission to...

The Early Career Researcher Autism Network (ECRAN) hosted their first workshop in July 2020. The workshop brought together 25 postdocs, 10 PhD students and 6 members of the autism community who are researchers themselves or who have a research interest in autism from...

Prof. Peter Scheiffele’s team at the Biozentrum, University of Basel, has discovered a new connection between a genetic modification and social difficulties related to autism: A mutation in the neuroligin-3 gene reduces the effect of the “feel good hormone” oxytocin....

The A-Reps are a group of autistic people, parents and carers from across Europe who have agreed to bring their perspectives on being autistic or caring for an autistic loved one to the AIMS-2-TRIALS research programme. They are coordinated by a team at the University...

Adaptive functioning refers to the ability to manage the demands of day-to-day life. It can include areas such as self-care, travel, shopping, cooking, fine motor skills and communication. It is understood that autistic people may learn some of these skills at a...

We are all very shocked and saddened by the effect that COVID-19 is having globally. We hope you are keeping safe and well during these uncertain and difficult times. We understand that some of you will be more affected than others either by being ill yourself, having...

An article in Molecular Autism by AIMS-2-TRIALS researchers will report that - contrary to predictions made by previous research – in an analysis of one of the largest data sets of its kind, no group differences were found in the brain activity of autistic and...

The Early Career Researcher Autism Network was launched earlier this year at the AIMS-2-TRIALS general assembly - an event that saw over thirty researchers share ideas about their training needs. To promote training opportunities for researchers in an early stage of...

Development of medicines is a key priority within the AIMS-2-TRIALS research programme and this will be achieved primarily via two clinical trials. A clinical trial is a specific type of research study that evaluates an intervention; in this case a medicine. The main...

AIMS-2-TRIALS researcher Sven Bölte and PhD student Pei-Yin Pan are part of a team using a new approach to explore the relationship between autism and physical health. Autistic people are known to be at particular risk for physical health issues such as digestive...

AIMS-2-TRIALS is celebrating prestigious awards received by two consortium members, both based at Kings College London. Oscar Marín, Director of the Centre for Developmental Neurobiology, was unanimously selected by an international jury to receive the Remedios Caro...

Congratulations to EU-AIMS, precursor to AIMS-2-TRIALS, which published more research than any other project in the Innovative Medicine Initiatives Joint Undertaking project call 3, with 255 papers by the end of 2017. This finding was reported in an IMI report – a...

Declan Murphy and Gráinne McAlonan of Kings College London were recently featured on BBC Radio 4's 'D for Diagnosis' with Claudia Hammond, discussing the diagnosis of autism and co-occurring conditions. https://twitter.com/Aims2Trials/status/1158370309495578625

Ten month old infants later diagnosed with autism use their gaze to attract other’s attention less often than those who are not autistic, shows research led by Terje Falck-Ytter at Uppsala University in Sweden, as part of AIMS-2-TRIALS. “Joint attention is extremely...

Computer algorithms that can spot patterns in vast amounts of data will drive the future of autism research and help scientists to understand autism’s true complexity and diversity, say AIMS-2-TRIALS researchers in a recent review article. The algorithms’ power comes...

AIMS-2-TRIALS researchers met with autistic people at events across Europe about the future of autism research. At Trinity College Dublin, Ireland, team members from the rare genetic conditions study led an event in February to foster two-way dialogue about the future...