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From 1 in 500 to 1 in 2,500 Americans suffer from autism, a brain disorder that begins in early childhood and impairs thinking, feeling, language, and the ability to relate to others. Families coping with this devastating illness are searching for answers about its causes, diagnosis, prevention, and treatment. The National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) is devoting an increasing portion of its research portfolio to this mission. NIMH's investment in autism-related science more than doubled over the past 4 years — from $9.4 million in FY 1997 to $22.6 million in FY 2000. The research is being funded through grants and contracts with investigators at universities. In addition, new Institute initiatives aimed at advancing basic knowledge of brain development and genetics also hold promise for understanding complex behavioral disorders like autism. NIMH's autism-related activities range from efforts to improve awareness, diagnosis and treatment, to studies involving brain imaging, tissue banks, animal models, genetics, developmental neurobiology, and neuropsychology. Implementing the Children's Health Act of 2000 As part of the Children's Health Act of 2000, Congress recently designated the NIMH to take the lead in expanding, intensifying and coordinating NIH's autism research effort, which more than doubled between 1997 and 2000. NIMH has begun implementing provisions of this landmark legislation, in collaboration with the four other Institutes represented on the NIH Autism Coordinating Committee (NIH/ACC): National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD), National Institute of Neurological Disorders and Stroke (NINDS), National Institute on Deafness and Other Communication Disorders (NIDCD), and National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences (NIEHS). An NIMH Snapshot The National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) is a component of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), the Government's principal biomedical and behavioral research agency. NIH is part of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. The actual total fiscal year 2000 NIMH budget was $974 million. NIMH Mission To reduce the burden of mental illness through research on mind, brain, and behavior. How Does the Institute Carry Out Its Mission? - NIMH conducts research on mental disorders and the underlying basic science of brain and behavior.
- NIMH supports research on these topics at universities and hospitals around the United States.
- NIMH collects, analyzes, and disseminates information on the causes, occurrence, and treatment of mental illnesses.
- NIMH supports the training of more than 1,000 scientists to carry out basic and clinical research.
- NIMH communicates information to scientists, the public, the news media, and primary care and mental health professionals about mental illnesses, the brain, mental health, and research in these areas.
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Centers of Excellence in Autism Research Foremost among the Act's provisions is a collaborative effort to support development of broadly based Centers of Excellence in Autism Research. This project will build new infrastructure for autism research by bringing together critical masses of expertise and resources at five or more dedicated research centers around the country. The Centers will conduct basic and clinical research, including investigations into causes, diagnosis, early detection, prevention, control, and treatment. The Centers will also include research in the fields of developmental neurobiology, genetics, and psychopharmacology. Interdisciplinary collaborations, including the recruitment of outstanding investigators who had previously not worked in the autism field, are being sought in an initial Request for (grant) Applications in FY 2001, with the Centers being funded in stages over the next few years. Public Input The Children's Health Act of 2000 mandates that the NIH make available information about its autism activities and facilitate public feedback to the NIH. Information Officers, Public Liaison Officers, and other staff from the NIH/ACC institutes meet annually with representatives of autism advocacy groups to exchange information and stay in touch via a list-serve. Members of the autism advocacy community also serve as public participants on NIMH scientific review committees. Brain Tissue and Genetics Resources The Children's Health Act of 2000 also calls on NIMH to take the lead in expanding a program under which samples of tissues and genetic materials are donated, collected, preserved, and made available for autism research. Post-mortem brain tissue, which has been very scarce for the study of autism, offers a unique, high-resolution window into the inner workings of brain cells. For example, by using radioactive tracers on thinly sliced sections of brain tissue, scientists can detect and pinpoint abnormal activity of genes within cells. Only with access to brain tissue can the underlying neuropathology of autism be uncovered. To take advantage of emerging opportunities for discovery in post-mortem tissue made possible by the new molecular methodologies, NIMH, in collaboration with the autism community and other NIH Institutes, is stepping up efforts to establish brain bank collections to study autism. Such brain banks work with families to arrange tissue donations upon the death of individuals with autism. For example, NIMH supports ongoing efforts by the Harvard Brain Tissue Resource Center, and at UCLA's West Los Angeles VA Medical Center, to collect and make this vital resource available to researchers. Supported under a contract with Washington University, the NIMH Center for Genetic Studies at Rutgers University has been receiving data and blood samples from NIMH-funded autism genetics projects at Stanford University, New England Medical Center, Vanderbilt University, and the University of North Carolina. These data and biomaterials will be widely distributed to the scientific community to conduct analyses on the genetic basis of autism, and their availability is expected to accelerate collaborations among researchers and the discovery of genes producing disease vulnerability.
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