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Review
. 2022 Mar 11;23(6):3033.
doi: 10.3390/ijms23063033.

Immune Dysregulation in Autism Spectrum Disorder: What Do We Know about It?

Maria de Los Angeles Robinson-Agramonte  1 , Elena Noris García  2 , Jarasca Fraga Guerra  3 , Yamilé Vega Hurtado  4 , Nicola Antonucci  5 , Neomar Semprún-Hernández  6 , Stephen Schultz  7 , Dario Siniscalco  8   9
Affiliations
Review

Immune Dysregulation in Autism Spectrum Disorder: What Do We Know about It?

Maria de Los Angeles Robinson-Agramonte et al. Int J Mol Sci. .

Abstract

Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is a group of complex multifactorial neurodevelopmental disorders characterized by a wide and variable set of neuropsychiatric symptoms, including deficits in social communication, narrow and restricted interests, and repetitive behavior. The immune hypothesis is considered to be a major factor contributing to autism pathogenesis, as well as a way to explain the differences of the clinical phenotypes and comorbidities influencing disease course and severity. Evidence highlights a link between immune dysfunction and behavioral traits in autism from several types of evidence found in both cerebrospinal fluid and peripheral blood and their utility to identify autistic subgroups with specific immunophenotypes; underlying behavioral symptoms are also shown. This review summarizes current insights into immune dysfunction in ASD, with particular reference to the impact of immunological factors related to the maternal influence of autism development; comorbidities influencing autism disease course and severity; and others factors with particular relevance, including obesity. Finally, we described main elements of similarities between immunopathology overlapping neurodevelopmental and neurodegenerative disorders, taking as examples autism and Parkinson Disease, respectively.

Keywords: T helper (Th) cells; adaptive immunity; autism spectrum disorder (ASD); autoimmunity; cytokines; human leukocyte antigens (HLA) alleles; innate immunity; major histocompatibility complex (MHC); neurodegenerative diseases; neuroimmunology; neuropsychiatric disorders; obesity.

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Conflict of interest statement

Authors declare no conflict of interest for this article.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
Included and excluded references screened for the literature review.
Figure 2
Figure 2
Immune dysregulation, ASD phenotypes, and treatment responses. (A) Soluble mediators from direct transfer across the placenta target the fetal brain and induce behavioral outcomes, differential phenotypes, and drug response in autism. (B) T cell subpopulations influencing microglial functioning drive synaptic growth factors, dysregulation, and signaling pathways (such as mTOR), contributing to differential clinical ASD phenotypes and treatment responses. The figure has been drawn using Power Point 2013.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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