ArticleExperimental biology and medicine (Maywood, N.J.)2023
N-acetylcysteine improves autism-like behavior by recovering autophagic deficiency and decreasing Notch-1/Hes-1 pathway activity.
Article in Experimental biology and medicine (Maywood, N.J.), 2023. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 9 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
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Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
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Who cites it
9 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it, 10 citations in OpenAlex.
- Valproate Exposure as anCNS & neurological disorders drug targets · 2025Pooled it
- Translational issues with phototherapy of cancer.Translational oncology · 2026Review
- The Interconnected Factors of Emotional Regulation, Trauma, and Substance Use in Non-Suicidal Self-Injury: A Case Study and Literature Review.Clinical case reports · 2025Article
- The Notch Signaling Pathway: A Potential Target for Mental Disorders.Molecular neurobiology · 2025Review
- Casomorphine-10 (CM-10) Peptide Orchestrates Circadian and Neurodevelopmental Gene Clusters via δ-Opioid Receptor Signaling: Insights from Transcriptome Analysis with δ-Opioid Receptor-Expressing HEK293 Cells.Life (Basel, Switzerland) · 2025Article
- The Notch pathway: A guardian of cell fate during neurogenesis.Current opinion in cell biology · 2025Review
- Autism spectrum disorder and a possible role of anti-inflammatory treatments: experience in the pediatric allergy/immunology clinic.Frontiers in psychiatry · 2024Review
- Transcutaneous auricular vagus nerve stimulation may benefit from the addition of N-acetylcysteine to facilitate motor learning in infants of diabetic mothers failing oral feeds.Frontiers in human neuroscience · 2024Article
- Valproic Acid in Pregnancy Revisited: Neurobehavioral, Biochemical and Molecular Changes Affecting the Embryo and Fetus in Humans and in Animals: A Narrative Review.International journal of molecular sciences · 2023Review
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
6 authors at 1 institution in 1 country.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
N-acetylcysteine (NAC) has been reported to improve social interaction behavior, irritability, self-injury, and anxiety-like behavior in autism. However, the molecular mechanism underlying the therapeutic roles of NAC in autism remains unknown. This study mainly aimed to investigate the therapeutic effect of NAC on valproic acid (VPA)-induced autism model and the underlying mechanisms. Our results showed that NAC ameliorated the deficits in sociability and the anxiety- and repetitive-like behaviors displayed by VPA-exposed rats. In addition, VPA exposure induced autophagic deficiency and enhanced Notch-1/Hes-1 pathway activity based on lowered Beclin-1 and LC3B levels, while increased expression of p62, Notch-1, and Hes-1 expression at the protein level. However, NAC recovered VPA-induced autophagic deficiency and reduced Notch-1/Hes-1 pathway activity in a VPA-exposed autism rat model and SH-SY5Y neural cells. The present results demonstrated that NAC improves autism-like behavioral abnormalities by inactivating Notch-1/Hes-1 signaling pathway and recovering autophagic deficiency. Taken together, this study helps to elucidate a novel molecular mechanism that underlies the therapeutic actions of NAC in autism and suggests its potential to ameliorate behavioral abnormalities in neurodevelopmental disorders.
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