Molecular characterization of X-linked cognitive disorders in which language impairment is a prominent symptom decisively contributes to a better understanding of the genetic programme involved in the development of the language organ. Proteins encoded by genes mutated in these disorders are structurally and functionally diverse: (i) helicases, (ii) homebox proteins, (iii) transcriptional regulators, (iv) translational regulators, (v) posttranslational regulators, and (vi) phosphoproteins. These proteins ultimately modulateneural development and function, as far as they seem to be involved in the regulation of (i) neural migration, (ii) neural identity, (iii) axonal growth, (iv) dendritic proliferation, (v) synaptogenesis, (vi) myelinization, (vii) neural plasticity, (viii) long-term potentiation and (ix) neural survival, but also in the modulation of basic cellular processes, like (x) chromosome segregation. Though these genes clearly make up the genetic programmes responsible for the emergence of different cognitive modules, they should be taken necessarily into account for an accurate molecular characterization of the language organ, since it is only programmes, but not genes, that should be properly regarded as idiosyncratic (i.e. most genes cannot reasonably be characterized as “linguistic”, unlike the programme itself related to the language organ).
Molecular biology
Aspectos moleculares de las enfermedades metabólicas que conllevan trastornos del lenguaje.
Molecular characterization of metabolic diseases in which language impairment is a prominent symptom decisively contributes to a better understanding of the molecular effects and ontogenetic context on the development of the language organ. Main etiological feature in these diseases is actually diverse, as it may be disturbed in: 1) hormone homeostasis; 2) sugar, creatine, carnitine, lipid, sulphur, organic acid, or aminoacid metabolism; 3) different cellular processes (lysosomal storage and mitochondrial function). Metabolic disturbances ultimately lead to structural and functional anomalies in different brain regions, which positively correlate with the linguistic and cognitive impairments. Functional cloning has greatly helped to identify genes involved in such metabolic diseases, and so to a better understanding of the innate programme involved in the development of the linguistic module.
