Endocrine Abstracts

Cortistatin is a neuropeptide that belongs to the somatostatin family, and shares 11 of its 14 amino acid residues with somatostatin. Studies in the central nervous system have shown that cortistatin has activities different from somatostatin, including enhancing slow wave sleep and selective conductances. However, in the periphery cortistatin appears to act as a somatostatin receptor analog. We have generated cortistatin ko mice and have analyzed the molecular, behavioral and...

Somatostatin (SST) and cortistatin (CORT) are two highly related neuropeptides involved in the regulation of several endocrine secretions. In particular, SST and CORT are two primary negative regulators of GH secretion. Consequently, SST or CORT knockout (KO) mice exhibit elevated GH levels; however, this does not lead to increased IGF-I levels or somatic growth, which has been suggested that could be due to a compensatory mechanism between both peptides. In order to test this...