Endocrine Abstracts

Background: Inflammatory cytokines in children with juvenile idiopathic arthritis (JIA) may modulate growth through systemic and local mechanisms.Aims: To study the relationship between inflammatory cytokines in serum /synovial fluid (SF) with growth and to assess the effects of serum/SF on the fetal rat metatarsal model.Subjects & Methods: 17 children with JIA (F,10): 8 oligoarticular, 2 extended oligoarticular, 6 polyarticula...

GCMB, which is the mammalian homologue of the Drosophila gene Glial cells missing, encodes a 506 amino acid parathyroid-specific transcription factor that contains: a DNA-binding domain at residues 21–174; a predicted nuclear localization signal at residues 176–193; an inhibitory domain at residues 258–347; and two transactivation domains at residues 174–263, and residues 428–506. Mutations of GCMB, which is located on chrom...

Constitutive neurogenesis in the adult mammalian brain (sub-ventricular zone, SVZ and dentate gyrus) implies the capacity for self-repair following brain injury. However, brain injury is usually permanently debilitating as neuronal self-repair responses are not sustained and resident neural stem cells (NSC) do not repopulate damaged tissue. Identification of NSC differentiating factors transiently activated post-injury will be key to enhancing NSC mobilisation and differentiat...

Good growth in children is associated with large, disordered, fluctuations in GH levels from week to week (Gill et al., 1999; Gill et al., 2001). However, GH treatment regimens are restricted to daily fixed doses which may not provide optimal growth. We have used GH-deficient dwarf rats (dw/dw) to test our hypothesis that variable GH dosing will enhance growth.Six week old, male dwarf rats (16 per group) were treated for 6 weeks with either...

The key mitotic regulator pituitary tumor transforming gene (PTTG) is expressed at low levels in fetal brain compared with adult, and modulates the proliferation of human embryonic neuronal N-Tera2 (NT2) cells. We examined the function and expression of PTTG’s interacting partner separase, along with Rad21, the functional component of cohesin, which is cleaved by separase following interaction with PTTG. In contrast to PTTG, the cleaved forms of separase and Rad21 were hi...

We have previously shown that premature piglets maintained on TPN develop fatty livers, but the underlying mechanisms associated with this response in unknown. The aim of the experiment was to use a piglet model for the premature human neonate on TPN to investigate lipase activity in key tissues.Piglets were delivered, by Caesarean, two days prematurely. Bilateral jugular catheters were surgically inserted within 6 hours of birth. Six control piglets wer...

Children diagnosed with either Growth Hormone deficiency (GHD) or Turner syndrome (TS) are both treated with GH titrated against either weight or area. The response to such treatment however, is highly variable and, at least in part, diagnosis dependent. The precise mechanisms underlying this variability are unknown. As basal GH levels differ between GHD and TS and, as GH elicits its effects through changes in gene expression, the basal gene expression profiles of GHD and TS s...

Inherited growth hormone insensitivity (GHI) is usually caused by mutations in the GH receptor (GHR). Patients present with short stature associated with a mid-facial hypoplasia (Laron facial features) or with normal facial appearance. We previously described an intronic mutation in the GHR gene (A−1 to G−1 substitution in intron 6) resulting in the activation of a pseudoexon (6Ψ) in four related GHI patients with normal facial fea...

The mouse steroid 21-hydroxylase-A gene promoter (21-OH) directs adrenal cortex-specific expression of the β-galactosidase reporter in 21-OHase/LacZ transgenic mice. Multiple independent 21-OHase/LacZ transgenic lines show a similar mosaic pattern of reporter expression probably reflecting stochastic transgene silencing. In the adult, the mosaic reporter expression occurs as radial stripes spanning the adrenal cortex. A similar radial striped pattern occurs ...

Introduction: It is known that growth hormone secretion is affected by age and patient’s sex. We have assessed pre-treatment IGF-1 levels and responses to a standard dose of exogenous growth hormone (0.4 mg daily) in males and females arbitrarily categorised into young (20–40 yrs), middle-aged (40–60 yrs) and elderly (over 60 yrs). All patients were growth hormone deficient on either an insulin tolerance test or a glucagon test, peak growth hormone did not rise ...