1
00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:14,000
Welcome to From the Spectrum Podcast. This is a podcast about autism. It is my goal to explain what is autism.

2
00:00:14,000 --> 00:00:22,000
I plan to use a mixture of scientific literature, personal experience, and opinion.

3
00:00:22,000 --> 00:00:35,000
With opinion, I will explain why. I will provide links to various references for each episode.

4
00:00:35,000 --> 00:00:41,000
For each episode, we will discuss various aspects of autism.

5
00:00:41,000 --> 00:00:53,000
The From the Spectrum Podcast will mostly avoid causes of autism, and I will try to avoid the increase of diagnoses of late.

6
00:00:53,000 --> 00:01:01,000
This is like playing tug-of-war with barbed wire, and I don't think I want to travel down that path.

7
00:01:01,000 --> 00:01:13,000
Before we get into the episode, I want to remind, I want to say, never underestimate a human's capacity to think.

8
00:01:13,000 --> 00:01:23,000
Never underestimate the infinity, the infinite amount of possibilities that can come from human thought.

9
00:01:23,000 --> 00:01:29,000
Human thought is very powerful.

10
00:01:29,000 --> 00:01:40,000
For today's episode, we will discuss two areas. One is the so-called network, and one is a brain region.

11
00:01:40,000 --> 00:01:52,000
We will expand on the Autism and Adaptive Responses episode, and we will also talk more in depth about the Reward Hub.

12
00:01:52,000 --> 00:01:59,000
We've discussed this network before, and this brain region before.

13
00:01:59,000 --> 00:02:09,000
The first network is the silence network, and the brain region is the nucleus accumbens.

14
00:02:09,000 --> 00:02:21,000
We have discussed both of these, but today we will expand this discussion for a better understanding and connections to autism,

15
00:02:21,000 --> 00:02:38,000
and to prepare to discuss differences between sex, female, male, or girl, boy, and diagnosing differences, autistic versus non-autistic.

16
00:02:38,000 --> 00:02:46,000
First, the silence network was discussed in the Autism and Adaptive Responses episode.

17
00:02:46,000 --> 00:02:57,000
However, we did not define it or mention it much because of the heavy biology discussion already built in to that episode.

18
00:02:57,000 --> 00:03:10,000
The ancilla, that unique region that is a hub for brain states, such as memory, remembering what happened in that environment,

19
00:03:10,000 --> 00:03:19,000
or whenever I do that, what happens then, or how we think and feel in that moment.

20
00:03:19,000 --> 00:03:31,000
Also, bodily states, the signals coming up from the body, such as heart rate activation, the rate and depth of our breath,

21
00:03:31,000 --> 00:03:39,000
or are we sweating, are we feeling tingly, are we excited, nervous, etc.

22
00:03:39,000 --> 00:03:48,000
And how we, as the living organism, is integrated into the environment.

23
00:03:48,000 --> 00:03:58,000
Is what I'm doing in this moment appropriate for the environment, appropriate for my task?

24
00:03:58,000 --> 00:04:07,000
Do I want more of what I'm experiencing in that moment, in that environment? Do I like that feeling?

25
00:04:07,000 --> 00:04:14,000
Do I want, and do I like, or do I not want, or like?

26
00:04:14,000 --> 00:04:24,000
How we learn and build from experiences, from memory, from learning, remember neuroplasticity.

27
00:04:24,000 --> 00:04:35,000
What we desire from the environment, what we desire out of our body, so we can have thoughts and feelings.

28
00:04:35,000 --> 00:04:42,000
Those are three crucial sources of data being interpreted in the insula.

29
00:04:42,000 --> 00:04:47,000
Remember research by Lucena Euden.

30
00:04:47,000 --> 00:05:02,000
The Salient Network detects and coordinates neural and behavioral responses to salient stimuli, what is considered most important right now.

31
00:05:02,000 --> 00:05:17,000
In other words, what is needed in that moment as we, as the living organism, is navigating society, navigating our life and this world.

32
00:05:17,000 --> 00:05:24,000
And if you remember Autism and Adaptive Responses episode, a lot of this was discussed.

33
00:05:24,000 --> 00:05:35,000
The insula works side by side here with the interior cingulate cortex and then that medial prefrontal cortex is heavily involved too.

34
00:05:35,000 --> 00:05:41,000
I also want to define Salient's Detection.

35
00:05:41,000 --> 00:05:48,000
Salient's Detection is attention and or perceptual grabs.

36
00:05:48,000 --> 00:05:58,000
How and what determines the most important resources for learning and survival.

37
00:05:58,000 --> 00:06:11,000
And remember the medial prefrontal cortex and the ACC leads the way during normal or healthy or adaptive responses.

38
00:06:11,000 --> 00:06:17,000
And in large part it's receiving information from the insula.

39
00:06:17,000 --> 00:06:30,000
Also remember when we make unhealthy or maladaptive responses, when we're overtaking by anxiety or depression, the insula kind of leads the way.

40
00:06:30,000 --> 00:06:41,000
We get overtaken by that interpretation of those other factors such as bodily states or environmental states that external stimuli.

41
00:06:41,000 --> 00:06:57,000
That can feed forward up to the insula and overpower all of our thoughts, all of those adaptive responses, even when we're capable of doing it, even when we have previously done it.

42
00:06:57,000 --> 00:07:02,000
We can get kind of hijacked, they say.

43
00:07:02,000 --> 00:07:13,000
Also consider the metabolic bank account and determining if we have enough metabolic resources for the demand.

44
00:07:13,000 --> 00:07:25,000
Those bodily states and those powerful thoughts, those rapid and constant thoughts that follow, they're very energizing.

45
00:07:25,000 --> 00:07:30,000
They take a lot of metabolic resources to process.

46
00:07:30,000 --> 00:07:42,000
And remember the medial prefrontal cortex at resting states is one of the most metabolically demanding areas of the brain.

47
00:07:42,000 --> 00:07:51,000
And let's not forget, we mustn't forget a typical autistic response with the outside world.

48
00:07:51,000 --> 00:08:07,000
It's common that it's considered the outside world, it's chaotic for the autistic person, it's chaotic for the biology that gives us autism.

49
00:08:07,000 --> 00:08:14,000
Also remember in the Autism and Adaptive Responses episode when discussing the insula.

50
00:08:14,000 --> 00:08:40,000
A study by Lucena Uden, the foremost of the insula showed the hyperfunction of the insula to and from sensory and other limbic areas, thus causing errors in attentional resources and subsequent guiding of adaptive responses during socialness.

51
00:08:40,000 --> 00:08:48,000
That sounds familiar with autism, that sounds like autism.

52
00:08:48,000 --> 00:09:00,000
So this episode will parse out key findings between sex differences and primarily implications into socialness.

53
00:09:00,000 --> 00:09:23,000
We covered in the Autism and Adaptive Responses episode the study released in Communications Biology not long ago, I believe April in 2024, that asked if brain connectivity and mechanisms altered brain connectivity in early development.

54
00:09:23,000 --> 00:09:46,000
The study using six-week-old infants, this is brilliant, distinguished between high likelihood based on family history of autism, so a six-week-old considered high likelihood to have autism, versus typical likelihood.

55
00:09:46,000 --> 00:10:12,000
This was using the silence network. The high likelihood have a stronger connection from the silence network, primarily the insula and ACC, to sensory motor regions, whereas the typical likelihood group have stronger connections from the silence network to the prefrontal regions.

56
00:10:12,000 --> 00:10:29,000
Remember, the medial prefrontal cortex, along with other areas of the prefrontal and the human cortex, lead that way, they make the appropriate decisions and responses.

57
00:10:29,000 --> 00:10:49,000
Those areas that make us the dominant species on earth is the prefrontal cortex and that human cortex. The areas that make our head extend up and full above the eyes unlike any other species.

58
00:10:49,000 --> 00:11:07,000
Remember, if we had to just simply define the overarching goal or the overarching role of the prefrontal cortex, it quiets things so that we can properly evaluate things.

59
00:11:07,000 --> 00:11:31,000
And that's huge. That's huge with autism and even without autism, maybe it's just social anxiety or essentially everyone can get hijacked in different moments, just rare occurrences to something that's pretty common or pretty debilitating in life.

60
00:11:31,000 --> 00:11:53,000
People can range in this, but if you think about autism, there's some key things to remember. We love rules. The prefrontal cortex is essentially, if we want to expand the definition, it's a flexible rule setting machine.

61
00:11:53,000 --> 00:12:11,000
You encounter different environments and you know how you're going to act or how you plan to act or how you typically react. You like that. People like that because we're essentially a predicting machine.

62
00:12:11,000 --> 00:12:30,000
If we want to eliminate that external stimuli, autism prefers eliminating all of that outside noise and we can do this. Essentially, as we get older, we can better control the environment and that helps.

63
00:12:30,000 --> 00:12:51,000
Children that can't, they typically have others, they have adults that can control their environment, make it less chaotic. And if you think about education and now the smaller classrooms or scheduled breaks, giving more breaks even.

64
00:12:51,000 --> 00:13:14,000
And if you remember my examples of elementary school being put into smaller groups for reading and comprehension and all the way up through my senior year with the pathways to success, that little group, that alternative school, when it was me and essentially maybe four other students, that was very manageable.

65
00:13:14,000 --> 00:13:28,000
These connections, these bi-directional connections or connections to and out of the prefrontal cortex is huge here and it's huge for human beings.

66
00:13:28,000 --> 00:13:51,000
Okay, now that we kind of refreshed, had a refresher on the prefrontal cortex and the predicting machine and the preferences, the routines, the external stimuli and so forth, let's consider that as we examine these connections with the silence network.

67
00:13:51,000 --> 00:14:06,000
Further, the high likelihood not only had an altered connection to sensory motor regions, they show a hypo-connection to that prefrontal area.

68
00:14:06,000 --> 00:14:24,000
Remember an earlier episode, an earlier discussion, it was long ago, it was one of the first episodes about the brain connections, about the differences between, let's say, a gravel road and a paved highway.

69
00:14:24,000 --> 00:14:43,000
How things, how vehicles maneuver and travel down these different roads. The gravel road has a poor connection in this case. The highway, the paved highway has that strong connection.

70
00:14:43,000 --> 00:14:57,000
The biology that gives us autism downstream, we have autism from these biological components, these gene expressions and DNA sequencing, etc.

71
00:14:57,000 --> 00:15:09,000
That gives us this trade-off. This is what is happening. This is what autism is biologically.

72
00:15:09,000 --> 00:15:29,000
Something nature and evolution has given us for perhaps a sense of protection. It prevents us, it prevents autistics from orienting towards that external stimuli, that outside world.

73
00:15:29,000 --> 00:15:45,000
This is seen at six weeks old. This is such a brilliant study. Remember autism and anxiety episode. Avoidance is one of the three features of anxiety.

74
00:15:45,000 --> 00:15:55,000
And again, in that episode, we were processing bodily states, brain states and the environment.

75
00:15:55,000 --> 00:16:12,000
Now, the question I have is, does this exist because autism gives us the ability to be comfortable within ourselves and provide us a path towards extreme fixation and interest.

76
00:16:12,000 --> 00:16:41,000
That path for superpowers or does or did that chaotic world and this biology creation, that perception of the outside world, cause this creation of comfort within ourselves that then gave us opportunity to prefer the ability and develop the comfort of staying within ourselves.

77
00:16:41,000 --> 00:16:49,000
Lastly, on the study using six week old inference based on the silence network connections.

78
00:16:49,000 --> 00:17:04,000
This connection predicted subsequent individual trajectories and social attention to faces using eye tracking from three months old to 12 months old.

79
00:17:04,000 --> 00:17:15,000
Using the same group, they show differences in eye tracking with that social attention that is very common with autism.

80
00:17:15,000 --> 00:17:27,000
And autistic traits at 12 months old using the autism observation scale for infants. They pick this up.

81
00:17:27,000 --> 00:17:40,000
Okay, now after extending the review on the previously mentioned six week old infants, followed until 12 months, they follow them all the way up to one year old.

82
00:17:40,000 --> 00:17:46,000
Let's review the current topic for us. Sex and diagnosis differences.

83
00:17:46,000 --> 00:18:11,000
A study on the relationship between polygenic or polygenic risk, which is some sort of calculation based off of each individual's genetic variance that will help determine their chance or risk, heritable risk of developing a disease, a condition.

84
00:18:11,000 --> 00:18:22,000
We will discuss more sex and diagnosing differences and polygenic risk in a future episode.

85
00:18:22,000 --> 00:18:36,000
So this episode used polygenic risk for autism and silence network connectivity between males, females, with and without autism.

86
00:18:36,000 --> 00:18:48,000
So four different groups here. Autistic males, autistic females, non-autistic males, non-autistic females.

87
00:18:48,000 --> 00:18:57,000
Between the ages of 8 and 17. Interestingly, this is from Gendar.

88
00:18:57,000 --> 00:19:08,000
So four satellite locations used Harvard Medical School, Seattle's Children's Research Institute, UCLA and Yale.

89
00:19:08,000 --> 00:19:14,000
We will discuss much more about Gendar in a future episode.

90
00:19:14,000 --> 00:19:35,000
Some key findings include, one, sex dependent effect on genetic load with silence network connectivity to sensory motor, thereby altering sensory processing and implicating repetitive behaviors.

91
00:19:35,000 --> 00:19:42,000
So the study used the silence network connectivity to sensory motor.

92
00:19:42,000 --> 00:19:46,000
Similar to the study we just reviewed.

93
00:19:46,000 --> 00:19:55,000
Sensory processing and repetitive behaviors. That sounds a lot like what people know about autism.

94
00:19:55,000 --> 00:19:59,000
This silence network is critical.

95
00:19:59,000 --> 00:20:07,000
Example, remember, serotypy is a misnomer. It is not.

96
00:20:07,000 --> 00:20:17,000
Purpose-less behavior. There is a purpose behind those repetitions or that stimming, those types of movements.

97
00:20:17,000 --> 00:20:23,000
It's relieving something, something built up.

98
00:20:23,000 --> 00:20:30,000
Saying it's purpose-less is a human thought. It's a very human creation.

99
00:20:30,000 --> 00:20:36,000
It doesn't fit in to the social norms. The social norms.

100
00:20:36,000 --> 00:20:44,000
Can you fit in or not? And are you like the so-called normal people or not?

101
00:20:44,000 --> 00:20:48,000
Humans love to group and categorize people.

102
00:20:48,000 --> 00:20:58,000
The second key finding, females in comparison to males show lower levels of restricted repetitive behaviors.

103
00:20:58,000 --> 00:21:06,000
That is, this protective female effect, which we will discuss more in a future episode.

104
00:21:06,000 --> 00:21:13,000
This protective female effect in regards to the silence network connection.

105
00:21:13,000 --> 00:21:22,000
This potentially explains the bias diagnosis of boys with autism.

106
00:21:22,000 --> 00:21:30,000
Our silence network orientes away from the outside world.

107
00:21:30,000 --> 00:21:34,000
OK, the nucleus accumbens.

108
00:21:34,000 --> 00:21:43,000
The nucleus accumbens is in the ventral striatum and is the hotspot for reward processing.

109
00:21:43,000 --> 00:21:50,000
The striatum is part of the basal ganglia, our go-no-go area.

110
00:21:50,000 --> 00:21:55,000
A lot of motivation and motor movements converging here.

111
00:21:55,000 --> 00:21:59,000
Just briefly on the nucleus accumbens.

112
00:21:59,000 --> 00:22:09,000
Major roles of the nucleus accumbens includes processing, motivation, aversion, reward,

113
00:22:09,000 --> 00:22:16,000
subjectively liking something and learning about that stimuli or the stimulus.

114
00:22:16,000 --> 00:22:19,000
Is it good or bad?

115
00:22:19,000 --> 00:22:24,000
If good, how much more of it do I want?

116
00:22:24,000 --> 00:22:27,000
Do I like it?

117
00:22:27,000 --> 00:22:34,000
There is a lot of dopamine and serotonin action in the nucleus accumbens.

118
00:22:34,000 --> 00:22:37,000
Remember, dopamine is wanting.

119
00:22:37,000 --> 00:22:42,000
Serotonin is having.

120
00:22:42,000 --> 00:22:46,000
Lastly, the nucleus accumbens is two parts.

121
00:22:46,000 --> 00:22:53,000
It is important for us to understand the nucleus accumbens in a future episode we discuss between

122
00:22:53,000 --> 00:22:59,000
autistic girls and autistic boys.

123
00:22:59,000 --> 00:23:05,000
The two parts are the shell and the core.

124
00:23:05,000 --> 00:23:12,000
The shell contains glucocorticoid receptors called cortical steroids,

125
00:23:12,000 --> 00:23:16,000
which is one of the two receptors for glucocorticoids.

126
00:23:16,000 --> 00:23:21,000
Remember how dopamine works alongside hormones.

127
00:23:21,000 --> 00:23:25,000
The shell also contains a lot of inhibitory actions.

128
00:23:25,000 --> 00:23:29,000
Remember excitation and habitation.

129
00:23:29,000 --> 00:23:31,000
A lot of GABA.

130
00:23:31,000 --> 00:23:40,000
GABA in the shell controls dopamine and acetylcholine, the molecule for focus.

131
00:23:40,000 --> 00:23:45,000
Also, there are abundant serotonin in the shell.

132
00:23:45,000 --> 00:23:49,000
The core contains some glutamate.

133
00:23:49,000 --> 00:23:54,000
We discussed glutamate with excitation and inhibition balance.

134
00:23:54,000 --> 00:23:57,000
Glutamate is excitation.

135
00:23:57,000 --> 00:24:01,000
GABA is inhibition.

136
00:24:01,000 --> 00:24:06,000
And remember part two of the excitation and inhibition episode.

137
00:24:06,000 --> 00:24:11,000
We discussed two glutamate receptors.

138
00:24:11,000 --> 00:24:16,000
NMDA and AMPA receptors.

139
00:24:16,000 --> 00:24:22,000
These are post-symnaptic.

140
00:24:22,000 --> 00:24:29,000
Remember from that discussion NMDA are connected to repetitive type behaviors.

141
00:24:29,000 --> 00:24:36,000
As AMPA are connected to social implications.

142
00:24:36,000 --> 00:24:43,000
These will come into play when discussing the differences of autistic boys and autistic girls.

143
00:24:43,000 --> 00:24:49,000
And non-autistic boys and non-autistic girls.

144
00:24:49,000 --> 00:24:57,000
Overall, the nucleus contents is approximately 95% GABA.

145
00:24:57,000 --> 00:25:00,000
And I believe that is on normal brains.

146
00:25:00,000 --> 00:25:06,000
I am not sure the breakdown for autistics.

147
00:25:06,000 --> 00:25:08,000
But most mostly remember this.

148
00:25:08,000 --> 00:25:14,000
The connections to subjective things we like and want.

149
00:25:14,000 --> 00:25:20,000
Which is two different things lacking in wanting or two different things.

150
00:25:20,000 --> 00:25:23,000
I'm just going to say.

151
00:25:23,000 --> 00:25:29,000
I'm not going to go into detail about sex differences with the nucleus accumbens.

152
00:25:29,000 --> 00:25:33,000
And autism versus non-autism just yet.

153
00:25:33,000 --> 00:25:38,000
But the data are very fascinating.

154
00:25:38,000 --> 00:25:44,000
Oxytocin and the nucleus accumbens are major regions of interest here.

155
00:25:44,000 --> 00:25:46,000
Remember it's shown.

156
00:25:46,000 --> 00:25:52,000
Oxytocin and serotonin must converge into the nucleus accumbens.

157
00:25:52,000 --> 00:25:55,000
For reward is motivating.

158
00:25:55,000 --> 00:25:58,000
Reward is enjoyable.

159
00:25:58,000 --> 00:26:03,000
Socialness is enjoyable.

160
00:26:03,000 --> 00:26:07,000
So we will need to know about oxytocin.

161
00:26:07,000 --> 00:26:09,000
Which we discussed last episode.

162
00:26:09,000 --> 00:26:11,000
The nucleus accumbens.

163
00:26:11,000 --> 00:26:14,000
Which we discussed here.

164
00:26:14,000 --> 00:26:16,000
The silence network.

165
00:26:16,000 --> 00:26:18,000
Also discussed here.

166
00:26:18,000 --> 00:26:24,000
And just socialness. A broad scope of socialness.

167
00:26:24,000 --> 00:26:27,000
Some things to consider.

168
00:26:27,000 --> 00:26:33,000
Autistic girls fit more into the so called social norms.

169
00:26:33,000 --> 00:26:40,000
So that sounds like a critical point of the entire assessment process.

170
00:26:40,000 --> 00:26:47,000
It's a critical distinguishing of diagnosing autism.

171
00:26:47,000 --> 00:26:54,000
Second is girls have more opportunity to develop social norms.

172
00:26:54,000 --> 00:27:05,000
And three, data suggests boys have altered connections for processing both neutral and negative social stimuli.

173
00:27:05,000 --> 00:27:10,000
So they use neutral and negative social stimuli.

174
00:27:10,000 --> 00:27:15,000
And so boys have altered connections for processing such.

175
00:27:15,000 --> 00:27:27,000
And four, autistic girls, non-autistic girls and non-autistic boys show similar social processing abilities.

176
00:27:27,000 --> 00:27:29,000
Is this accurate?

177
00:27:29,000 --> 00:27:31,000
We will find out.

178
00:27:31,000 --> 00:27:34,000
And I'm looking forward to that.

179
00:27:34,000 --> 00:27:37,000
This is what I know.

180
00:27:37,000 --> 00:27:48,000
Autistic girls have more activity in the nucleus accumbens, including oxytocin and more connectivity through whole brain reward processes.

181
00:27:48,000 --> 00:27:52,000
Which includes previously discussed regions.

182
00:27:52,000 --> 00:27:54,000
The striatum.

183
00:27:54,000 --> 00:27:59,000
Remember the ventral side, the nucleus accumbens we just discussed.

184
00:27:59,000 --> 00:28:02,000
And the dorsal side, the dorsal striatum.

185
00:28:02,000 --> 00:28:06,000
Stimulus responses.

186
00:28:06,000 --> 00:28:12,000
The thalamus, which is central to all sensory processing.

187
00:28:12,000 --> 00:28:16,000
All senses come through the thalamus.

188
00:28:16,000 --> 00:28:19,000
And the medial prefrontal cortex.

189
00:28:19,000 --> 00:28:25,000
Mostly areas covered in autism and adaptive responses.

190
00:28:25,000 --> 00:28:26,000
Get it?

191
00:28:26,000 --> 00:28:34,000
Girls are equipped to navigate and adapt the so-called adaptive responses.

192
00:28:34,000 --> 00:28:42,000
Autistic girls have increased reward processing and silence detection and social understanding.

193
00:28:42,000 --> 00:28:52,000
Lastly, using eye tracking measures, girls have increased volitional social attention.

194
00:28:52,000 --> 00:28:56,000
Boys have increased attention to objects.

195
00:28:56,000 --> 00:28:58,000
So in comparison group.

196
00:28:58,000 --> 00:29:06,000
Girls, more social attention. Boys, more attention to objects.

197
00:29:06,000 --> 00:29:10,000
Sounds like what people know about autism.

198
00:29:10,000 --> 00:29:17,000
Girls have decreased attention to the objects.

199
00:29:17,000 --> 00:29:29,000
As we wrap up today, we covered the silence network and the nucleus accumbens.

200
00:29:29,000 --> 00:29:39,000
Differences such as autistic boys, autistic girls, non-autistic boys, non-autistic girls.

201
00:29:39,000 --> 00:29:49,000
And this will be key for a future discussion with one of the leading researchers at UCLA and a part of GENDAR.

202
00:29:49,000 --> 00:29:52,000
We will discuss these in depth.

203
00:29:52,000 --> 00:30:00,000
So for today, it is very important that we have some background information for this discussion.

204
00:30:00,000 --> 00:30:03,000
I'm looking forward to it.

205
00:30:03,000 --> 00:30:10,000
In addition, she will explain polygenic score and protective female effect.

206
00:30:10,000 --> 00:30:18,000
What this looks like for the female, the girl, and we'll explore the sex biases.

207
00:30:18,000 --> 00:30:19,000
Why?

208
00:30:19,000 --> 00:30:28,000
The lopsidedness with diagnosing autism in boys versus girls.

209
00:30:28,000 --> 00:30:36,000
If you are listening to the episode or listening to the podcast, please feel free to leave a review or rating.

210
00:30:36,000 --> 00:30:42,000
In podcasting, reviews, ratings, and downloads are huge.

211
00:30:42,000 --> 00:30:46,000
And I very much appreciate your feedback.

212
00:30:46,000 --> 00:30:59,000
You can contact me at info.fromthespectrum.gmail.com.

213
00:30:59,000 --> 00:31:17,000
And thank you for listening to From the Spectrum Podcast.