Sex steroid hormone balance and endocrine health in autistic people
Summary
This doctoral research project will be hosted in the Autism Research Centre in the Department of Psychiatry. The PhD student will be a part of a multi-disciplinary team of researchers who study the prenatal determinants of the neurocognitive development and physical and mental health of autistic people.
Researchers in the Autism Research Centre were among the first to propose the ‘prenatal sex steroid’ theory of autism and find evidence that autistic people have elevated prenatal androgens and estrogens, and autistic women have a higher likelihood of developing endocrine conditions such as polycystic ovary syndrome.
Project aims
The PhD candidate will have an opportunity to continue this line of research and study the effects of prenatal sex steroid hormones, such as testosterone and estrogens, on neurodevelopment, autism likelihood and the health of autistic people, using a variety of methods.
This will include epidemiological assessments of endocrine health using large population registries in the UK and abroad, which contain GP and hospitalisation records. In addition, the PhD candidate will help set up new, targeted clinical assessments of autistic people, at various points of development, which may include the measurement of sex steroid levels, body composition, brain growth and surveys of steroid-related traits and symptoms.
Finally, the PhD candidate will have an opportunity to integrate genomic data from publicly available resources, with the aim to uncover the shared genetic determinants of steroid regulation, sensitivity and autism and related neurodevelopmental conditions. It is hoped that this line of research will lead to a better understanding of why these conditions are more common in males than females, and reveal novel insight into the different health needs of autistic men and women.
Contact details
Professor Sir Simon Baron-Cohen - sb205@cam.ac.uk
Opportunities
This project is open to applicants who want to do a:
- PhD