Dislexias evolutivas: qué pueden decirnos la neurología y la genética al respecto

Dyslexia is a learning disability in which reading (but not other) impairment is the most prominent symptom, feasibly caused by incorrect phonological processing. Typically, the brains of disabled readers show malformations and functional anomalies during reading. Currently, different genes have been linked (or associated) to dyslexia. Proteins encoded by them have probed to be involved in neuronal migration and axon guidance during the formation of the cortex. In other organisms, local loss of function of most of these genes results in brain malformations and deficits related to auditory processing and learning, which resemble those observed in dyslexics. Dyslexia seems to be highly comorbid with other learning disabilities. Up to a point this comorbidity could be explained if some of these genes simultaneously regulate the development of neuronal structures relevant for other cognitive abilities, whose impairment is clinically described as a different disease.