Health Viewpoints

What We Can Learn from Mouse Models of Autism

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What We Can Learn from Mouse Models of Autism
A mouse is seen in a plastic box at the Laboratory Animal Services Center (LASC) of the University of Zurich in Schlieren, Switzerland, on Feb. 07, 2022. Arnd Wiegmann/Reuters
Stephanie Seneff
Updated:

Autism is a complex neurodevelopmental disorder whose incidence has been rising dramatically in the past two decades, in step with the dramatic rise in the use of glyphosate (the active ingredient in the pervasive herbicide Roundup) on core food crops [1, 2]. While correlation does not necessarily mean causation, there are multiple mechanisms by which glyphosate’s disruption of human biology, and the biology of the gut microbiome, could cause many of the observed symptoms and biological metrics associated with autism [3, 4].
Stephanie Seneff
Stephanie Seneff
Author
Stephanie Seneff is a Senior Research Scientist at the MIT Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory. She received the B.S. degree in Biophysics in 1968, the M.S. and E.E. degrees in Electrical Engineering in 1980, and the Ph.D. degree in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science in 1985, all from MIT. For over three decades, her research interests have always been at the intersection of biology and computation: developing a computational model for the human auditory system, understanding human language so as to develop algorithms and systems for human computer interactions, as well as applying natural language processing (NLP) techniques to gene predictions. She has published over 170 refereed articles on these subjects, and has been invited to give keynote speeches at several international conferences. She has also supervised numerous Master’s and PhD theses at MIT. In 2012, Dr. Seneff was elected Fellow of the International Speech and Communication Association (ISCA).
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