Approaches to the Neuropsychopharmacology of Autism

The goal for this talk is to discuss the translation potential in psychopharmacology research.  The speaker will start by reviewing current evidence for use of different classes of psychopharmacologic agents in autism.  She will then review basic science data that may in fact support the use of some of these compounds in autism and highlight that although we did not get to such medications through a translational route, translational evidence may exist to support their use and may suggest alternative symptom targets to be tested.  She will then explore the potential that by studying the mechanism of treatment response and side effect generation, we have the potential of elucidating the neurobiology of autism (introduce the concept of back-translation)