In this Spectrum News article, responses concerning attendance at the previously in-person 2021 Society for Neuroscience Conference are highlighted. Dr. Brumback’s thoughts on the matter are featured alongside other autism researchers. In response to the question, Dr. Brumback stated, “It was just sort of hard to envision going and spending time with 30,000 of my best international friends…”

“It’s exciting to see how different genetic changes can converge onto the same circuits in the brain, and even onto the same physiological mechanism,” says Audrey Brumback, assistant professor of neurology and pediatrics at the University of Texas at Austin, who was not involved in the research. “We’re really then getting toward the final common pathway that could be a target for treatment…”

“We hope that by understanding the anatomy and physiology of motor stereotypies, we can make them less stigmatizing and develop ways to harness their benefits to help people with and without autism…”

“There’s been so much work done on the prefrontal cortex in autism, but we’re starting to understand that a lot of what the prefrontal cortex does is orchestrated by the thalamus…”

“Having the multiple models is really a strength,” says Audrey Brumback, assistant professor of neurology and pediatrics at the University of Texas at Austin, who was not involved in the work. “This is pretty rare to have so many models studied in such detail in a systematic fashion.”

In this Spectrum News article, Dr. Brumback’s quote emphasizes the severity of a lack of coordination in prefrontal cortical region activity and its role in autism spectrum disorder. As discussed in the article, this outcome impairs executive function.