Endocrine Abstracts

Fine-needle aspiration biopsy (FNAB) is the tool of choice for evaluating thyroid nodules but there is a significant percentage of insufficient or indeterminate aspirates and falsely reassuring results have been reported in up to 6% of cases.We aimed to examine our experience with FNAB among a large cohort of unselected patients with thyroid nodules.239 consecutive patients (211 women) underwent FNA of a thyroid nodule between July...

Prostate cancer (PC) growth is androgen-dependent, hence, the mainstay for treatment is hormone-ablation therapy using anti-androgens, and/or androgen-deprivation therapies. Unfortunately, after a median time of 18 months, the cancer reappears in an androgen independent form, termed castrate-resistant PC (CRPC), which is largely fatal. To date, many molecular mechanisms have been suggested to be responsible for persistent AR signalling in CRPC. AR variants (AR-Vs), short forms...

Post-translational modifications of histones such as methylation, acetylation, and phoshorylation regulate chromatin structure and gene expression. However, phosphorylation of histone H3 at threonine 11 (H3T11ph) has not been linked to transcriptional regulation. Here we show that protein kinase C-related kinase 1 (PRK1) phosphorylates H3T11 upon ligand-dependent recruitment to androgen receptor (AR) target genes. PRK1 is pivotal to AR function since PRK1 knockdown by RNAi or ...

Introduction: Chronic hypercortisolemia during Cushing Syndrome (CS) determines significant changes in the plasticity and function of metabolic tissues like visceral adipose tissue (VAT). Persistence of alterations in VAT function after CS remission is under debate, as data of clinical studies is not consistent due to confounder factors and limited availability of VAT. Animal model of reversible CS presents long-term alterations on VAT after remission. We investigate VAT alter...

Background: The majority of thyroid nodules are clinically insignificant, however considerable overlap in radiological characteristics exists for benign and malignant lesions. Recently, validated radiological criteria using thyroid imaging reporting and data system scoring (TIRADS) have shown correlation between cumulative suspicious features and risk of malignancy1.Objective: To assess sensitivity, specificity and reliability of ultrasound sc...

J Larry Jameson & Lewis Landsberg Dean, Vice-President for Medical Affairs, Northwestern University, Evanston, Illinois, USA; Feinberg School of Medicine, Northwestern University, Evanston, Illinois, USA AbstractJ Larry Jameson, MD, PhD, received his medical degree with honors and a doctoral degree in biochemistry from the University of North Carolina in 1981. He performed his clinical training in internal medicin...

Introduction: Efficient fuel selection between glucose and fatty acids in insulin-sensitive organs is a key feature which determines metabolic health in humans. In skeletal muscle, lipid storage and utilisation can differ between healthy and diseased individuals, however to date there are limited in vitro models to explore this. Therefore, aim of this work was to investigate the effects of nutrition on engineered skeletal muscle health and metabolism.<p class="abs...

Bone marrow stem cells (BMSCs) are able to differentiate along multiple lineages including adipogenic and osteogenic lineages. The adenosine A1 receptor (A1R) modulates adipose tissue function causing an inhibition of lipolysis. We therefore studied A1R expression in BMSCs induced to differentiate along the adipogenic lineage.BMSCs were isolated from rat femur (10 wk male Wistar), cultured in control medium (alphaMEM 10% FCS) and then plated into adipocy...

Mutations in the leptin receptor gene (Lepr) occur spontaneously in humans and mice and are linked to early onset obesity and diabetes. Mice heterozygous for a signalling-deficient receptor (db/+) are widely used as a model of gestational diabetes that results in fetal macrosomia, but the contribution of the fetal genotype has yet to be evaluated. Eight week old wild type (wt) females (n=8) were mated to db/+ males and db/+ females (n=10) were mated to wt males i...

Mark E Molitch, Feinberg School of Medicine, Northwestern University, Chicago, IL, USA AbstractMark E. Molitch, MD, is Professor of Medicine and a Member of the Division of Endocrinology, Metabolism and Molecular Medicine at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine, in Chicago, Illinois. Prior to joining the faculty at Northwestern in 1984, Dr. Molitch was an Associate Professor at Tufts University School of...