Researcher Wants to Untangle Environmental, Genetic Complexities of Autism
Associate professor Heather Volk of Johns Hopkins University has been researching how interactions between genetic factors such as mutations, and environmental factors, such as air pollution, cause autism spectrum disorder in children. Volk’s focus is to understand how the environment affects children’s health and find ways to help children thrive by changing these environments. This differs slightly from research in the early 2000s, which focused more on getting to the bottom of what caused autism. Recent data from the WHO estimates that globally, roughly 1 in 100 children has autism. Statistics also show that boys are almost four times more…
