Imagine trying to understand a city by looking at a map that only shows the average height of every building. That is how doctors often look at brain scans, using a single average number to represent the whole area. But what if the city has unique neighborhoods with very different heights? A new study looked at the brain's electrical signals in 3,767 people with autism spectrum conditions and 1,198 with other conditions to see if this detailed view matters.
The researchers used a special computer method to measure how organized these electrical signals are across different parts of the brain. They discovered that the brains of people with autism show a much more varied pattern of electrical activity. This variation happens at a specific scale, roughly the size of a few centimeters, and it stays the same whether the person is awake or asleep. This pattern closely matches the physical shape of the brain's folds and grooves.
This finding is important because it shows that standard methods, which only look at average brain activity, miss these unique details. The new method was much better at telling apart people with autism from others than the old ways. However, this is a discovery about how the brain works, not a new test you can take at a doctor's office. We still need to learn more before this can help doctors make decisions for patients.
