Texas Children’s Hospital and Baylor researcher joins ARIA IMPACT Network to advance autism therapies

Dr. Jimmy Holder, associate professor in pediatrics at Baylor College of Medicine and Principal investigator at the Jan and Dan Duncan Neurological Research Institute at Texas Children's Hospital, and his team have received a grant for up to $17.25 million from Aligning Research to Impact Autism (ARIA) to become a part of the Innovative Medicine and Precision Approaches to Clinical Trials (IMPACT) Network.

As part of the IMPACT Network, Holder and his team will serve as one of an initial 12 collaborative sites around the world designed to accelerate clinical trial readiness and implementation to find promising therapies for different forms of autism, including both those related to a rare genetic mutation and those without an identified genetic cause.

The ARIA initiative's support could not come at a better time, as our understanding of autism has advanced so that we now stand at an exciting precipice, ready to translate that progress into clinical trials and life-changing treatments for patients and families. Joining the ARIA IMPACT Network will allow Baylor and Texas Children's Hospital to accelerate our breakthrough work to bring effective therapies to people with autism those with related neurodevelopmental disorders."

Dr. Jimmy Holder, associate professor in pediatrics, Baylor College of Medicine

The selection of the Duncan Neurological Research Institute at Texas Children's and Baylor reflects the organizations' many years of investment in autism research and clinical care. Since the institute's creation in 2010, Duncan NRI researchers have discovered or co-discovered the genetic basis of numerous neurological and developmental disorders, including Rett syndrome, an autism spectrum disorder.

An international leader in genetics, neuroscience, and pediatrics with an emphasis on multidisciplinary collaboration, the Duncan NRI is well-positioned to contribute to the ARIA initiative's scientific discovery. As part of this network, Baylor and Texas Children's will contribute to a short-term natural history and clinical endpoint study, which aims to better understand how autism and related neurodevelopmental conditions develop and change over time in children with profound autism.

Holder's own research lab focuses on the SHANK3 and SYNGAP1 genes, which cause severe neurodevelopmental disorders, such as autism spectrum disorders and intellectual disabilities, when mutations occur. By identifying these mutations and the processes they affect, his team is working to find therapeutic targets for these disorders.

ARIA is an initiative that connects emerging research, insights, and promising technologies from across scientific fields with the goal of advancing scientific discovery and creating more therapeutic opportunities for people with profound autism and people on the spectrum. 

"The ARIA IMPACT Network was built on the premise that no single institution can generate the scale and quality of evidence this field needs on its own," said Ekemini Riley, PhD, managing director of ARIA. "The team at Texas Children's Hospital brings the expertise and dedication that make this kind of coordinated science possible, and we are glad to have them as partners in advancing therapeutic opportunities for autistic people and related neurodevelopmental conditions."

Collaborators who will be joining Holder on this project include:

• Dr. Holly Harris, associate professor of pediatrics at Baylor and developmental-behavioral pediatrics specialist at Texas Children's;
• Dr. Mirjana Maletic-Savatic, professor of pediatrics – neurology at Baylor and investigator at the Duncan NRI;
• Dr. Michael Wangler, associate professor of molecular and human genetics at Baylor and human genetics and investigator at the Duncan NRI;
• Dr. Davut Pehlivan, assistant professor of pediatrics – neurology at Baylor;
• Dr. Daniel Curry, professor of neurosurgery at Baylor and director of functional neurosurgery and epilepsy surgery at Texas Children's;
• Dr. Robin Kochel, associate professor of pediatrics – psychology at Baylor and associate director for research, Autism Center at Texas Children's;
• Dr. Bernhard Suter, associate professor of pediatrics – neurology at Baylor and neurologist at Texas Children's;
• Dr. Anne Anderson, professor of pediatrics – neurology at Baylor, chief of clinical neurophysiology at Texas Children's, and Cain Laboratories investigator at the Duncan NRI;
• Dr. Matthew McGinley, associate professor of neuroscience at Baylor and Cain Laboratories investigator at the Duncan NRI;
• Dr. Zhandong Liu, associate professor of pediatrics – neurology at Baylor, chief of computational sciences at Texas Children's and principal investigator at the Duncan NRI;
• Dr. Leandra Berry, assistant professor of pediatrics at Baylor and pediatric neuropsychologist at Texas Children's