Researchers are looking at a link between a mother's immune system during pregnancy and the development of autism in children. They found that antibodies in the blood of mothers of kids with autism bind to fetal brain cells, and may be responsible for problems in brain development. This was observed in mothers of children with a particular kind of "late-onset" autism, where development seems fine up to a point, and then switches to a loss in language and social skills. There's hope that this finding will ultimately result in prenatal tests and interventions.
So why does a fetal event result in autism that shows up much later? Researchers aren't entirely sure, but there may be more to the story. The senior author of the study says, "It's possible that early exposure to maternal antibodies sets in motion
a biological path to autism with the behavioral outcomes not apparent
until much later. It's also possible that an environmental exposure
sometime after birth could be required to set this process in motion." But this study does show that research may need to focus more on the earliest gestational events, even when the autism doesn't manifest until much later in life.
