Friday, 2 February 2007
9:00 - 10:00 AM

The Seminar will be held in the Gonda Center First Floor Conference Room, Rm 1357
E5 on the South sector of the UCLA Campus Map.

All are welcome!

For further information contact Candace Wilkinson at (310) 825-9041.

Applying the logic of adult lesion studies to a developmental disorder, such as autism, is surely a useful first approach. But what does it really mean if, for example, the fusiform gyrus does not activate normally during face processing in individuals with autism? I will address this question and will discuss why network approaches to autism are more promising than those focusing on single brain loci. One set of structural MRI evidence suggests that the brain grows too fast in the first few years of life in autism. This finding also applies to white matter and may thus indicate early overconnectivity. Some functional connectivity (fcMRI) studies in older individuals with autism, on the other hand, seem to suggest general underconnectivity. I will present data that are partly inconsistent with the theory of underconnectivity in autism and will discuss methodological decisions that may affect fcMRI results. Finally, I will consider how early white matter overgrowth in autism may relate developmentally to atypical connectivity later in life.

Recent related publications:
Villalobos, M.E., Mizuno, A., Dahl, B.C., Kemmotsu, N. & Müller, R.-A. (2005) Reduced functional connectivity between V1 and inferior frontal cortex associated with visuomotor performance in autism. Neuroimage 25: 916-925.

Kemmotsu, N., Villalobos, M.E., Gaffrey, M.S., Courchesne, E. & Müller, R.-A. (2005) Activity and functional connectivity of inferior frontal cortex associated with response conflict. Cognitive Brain Research, 24: 335-342.

Turner, K.C., Frost, L., Linsenbardt, D., McIlroy, J.R. & Müller, R.-A. (2006) Atypically diffuse functional connectivity between caudate nuclei and cerebral cortex in autism. Behavioral and Brain Functions 2: 34-45.

Brenner, L.A., Turner, K.C. & Müller, R.-A. (in press) Eye movement and visual search: Are there elementary abnormalities in autism? Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders.

Müller, R.-A. (in press). Language universals in the brain: How linguistic are they? In M. H. Christiansen, C. Collins and S. Edelman (Ed.), Language Universals. Oxford University Press.

Müller, R.-A. (in press). Functional neuroimaging of developmental disorders: Lessons from autism research. In F. D. Hillary and J. DeLuca (Ed.), Functional Neuroimaging in Clinical Populations. Guilford.