Endocrine Abstracts

In modern societies, the risk of developing metabolic disorders such as obesity or type-2 diabetes is associated with the prevalence of psychosocial stress. Therefore, an improved understanding of adaptive stress responses and their underlying molecular mechanisms is of high clinical interest. In response to an acute stressor, animals activate the sympathetic nervous system and the hypothalamus–pituitary–adrenal (HPA) axis releasing catecholamines and glucocorticoids...

Ultradian rhythms of glucocorticoid hormones is crucial for optimal glucocorticoid-target gene expression, and therefore it is important to understand the mechanisms regulating glucocorticoid pulsatility and how it becomes disrupted in disease. I will discuss our recent findings on how the adrenal steroidogenic pathway responds dynamically to pulses of ACTH, both in vitro in adrenocortical cells and in vivo in the rat, and how these dynamics become disrupted ...

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