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	Podcast:		UC Science Today
	Episode:		New insight into how some drug therapies for autism work
	Category:		Science & Medicine
	Duration:		00:01:02
	Publish Date:		2016-05-13 00:00:00
	Description:		Risperidone, a drug used to reduce irritability in people with autism, was not as effective as estrogens in correcting autism-like behavior in a study on zebrafish. Matthew State of the University of California, San Francisco and a team of international scientists introduced a gene known to cause autism in humans into these fish. They found that estrogens completely stopped their nighttime hyperactivity, which is a symptom of autism. Risperidone also prevented this behavior, but it made the fish less active during the day. "It doesn't explain why risperidone works. What it did do, was say, that of the medications that we know are FDA-approved for autism, they also will correct some of the abnormalities that are a consequence of these mutations in zebrafish. What we’re hoping for is that if we find a point of biological convergence, that will help narrow in on really the critical aspect of biology that is potentially, a target for therapeutics."
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