Savants Syndrome, Autism, Genetics

I watched a program recently on Savants Syndrome. Savants Syndrome appears share some symptoms and behaviors with autism. I found the notion that some forms of autism could lead to individuals with significantly increased mental capabilities quite intriguing.

The question that arose in my mind was that when the brain evolved hundreds of thousands of years ago, did our predecessors experience and increase in unstable mental development that might have had the equivalent range and complexity that autism has today?

I've mentioned before my recent interest in the idea that the genetic processes that support evolution may themselves be highly complex, highly evolved, and may be able to act much much faster than we anticipate. I've been particularly interested in how environmental factors might influence the genetic process (and whether there is any merit to the concept of pangensis postulated by Darwin.)

I've also linked to articles showing how plants seem to adapt more quickly with increased UV radiation. If increases in UV radiation in the past foretold rapid environmental change, then theoretically those species which underwent adaptation in the presence of increased UV radiation would have been more likely to survive.

Which all leads to the question -- is the increase in UV radiation and skin cancer related in any way to the increase in autism? Or is there some other potential genetic driver for autism? Could the increase in autism portend an evolutionary advance in brain power?

CNN.com - Savants: Charting 'islands of genius' - Sep 14, 2006

Our Stolen Future: Drastic increase in autism rate in California: "All of the alternative explanations of the increase, —factors that might have made it seem like there was an increase in autism rates when there really wasn't— were rejected by M.I.N.D.'s study. This led to the inescapable conclusion that the rate of autism in children in California has increased. For whatever reason, children born in California since 1980 are more likely to develop autism than those born before."


[Update September 11, 2007]

Two recent articles seem to add some supporting evidence to my pontification.

First, there does seem to be correlating evidence of historically increased genetic adaptation/mutation in the genes involved in schizophrenia.

Genes Associated With Schizophrenia Evolved Rapidly Due To Selection During Human Evolution

Second, apparently we have used radiation to accelerate genetic evolution in plants. The assumption seems to be that radiation increases random point mutations, but perhaps the radiation to genetic adaptation mechanism is slightly more complicated.

Useful Mutants, Bred With Radiation