Individuals with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) report a host of sensory symptoms, which suggests a fundamental, genetic (Miles, 2011) neural signaling deficit in autistic brains (Rubenstein & Merzenich, 2003). However, neither animal models nor previous theories explaining sensory symptoms have been able to predict neurophysiological data in autistic humans. Here we show a strikingly similar trajectory of visual development in a genetic Drosophila Nhe3 model of autism and in autistic human

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... icipants. We report a dissociation between first- and second-order electrophysiological visual responses to steady-state stimulation in adults with ASD as well as a large sample of neurotypical individuals with high numbers of autistic traits. We also report a strikingly similar impairment in the adult fruit fly model of ASD. We explain this as a selective signaling abnormality in the transient response mechanisms in the visual system. In contrast to adults, autistic children show decreases in both first- and second-order responses, which are closely matched by the fruit fly model, suggesting a compensatory change in processing occurs over the course of development. Our results provide the first animal model of autism comprising a developmental sensory pathway phenotype.