Endocrine Abstracts

The pituitary is an anatomically well protected endocrine gland in permanent contact with the central nervous system. Although it was known that pituitary has plasticity in response to the physiological demands of the body, there were few clear data about the post-natal mechanisms in charge of this plasticity. The discovery of a group of cells expressing stem cell markers precisely organized in the outer zone of the adenopituitary open up new possibilities to explain the const...

Introduction: About 30% of all familial isolated pituitary adenoma (FIPA) and 50% of acromegaly families have a mutation in the aryl hydrocarbon receptor-interacting protein gene (AIP; Chahal, TEM, 2010). The functional role of AIP in somatotroph cells is unknown. Recently, it has been proposed that wild type AIP (wtAIP) is a tumor suppressor gene, role that is lost in the different mutant AIPs (mAIP; Leontiou, JCEM, 2008). In the adenomas, mAIPs are usually foun...