Endocrine Abstracts

Background: Obesity is the excessive accumulation of adipose tissue to the extent that health may be impaired. Determination of the mechanisms governing adipose deposition and body weight regulation are now a scientific priority. High dietary fat intake is generally considered to be a factor in obesity’s multi-factorial aetiology and the metabolic syndrome. Yet not all dietary fats appear to be obese genic to the same degree.Objective: To study the ...

Introduction: It is not known if non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) predates type 2 diabetes. We will study the prevalence of NAFLD in women with previous gestational diabetes (GDM), a population at ≥60% risk for the development of type 2 diabetes, while glucose tolerance is non-diabetic. It is not known if hepatic fat accumulation in NAFLD is disproportionate to fat accumulation in other tissues. We aim to study the association between fat in the liver and in tis...

Using functional MRI, we examined how regional brain activity varies with nutritional state when viewing food pictures of different caloric density and appeal.Eighteen non-obese healthy volunteers (BMI 22.2±0.5 kg/m2, age range 19–36 years, 8 male) were studied on 2 separate mornings after an overnight fast (mean±S.E.M. 15.5±0.3 h) or when fed (1.2±0.1 h after breakfast, food intake 45±4% of estimat...

The rise in the prevalence of obesity has imparted urgency to the study of the mechanisms of appetite regulation. Oxyntomodulin (OXM) and glucagon-like peptide-1 (GLP-1) are anorexigenic gut hormones thought to act via the same receptor. There is an increasing body of evidence, however, that they may act via distinct pathways. Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) is increasingly being used as a tool for tracking changes in neuronal activity in vivo through time. Manganese-e...

Kisspeptin is a recently identified reproductive hormone which serves as a crucial activator of the Hypothalamic–Pituitary–Gonadal (HPG) axis via stimulation of GnRH neurones. We have previously observed that a single kisspeptin injection increases LH pulsatility while twice daily kisspeptin injections can even advance the menstrual cycle. Furthermore, we have demonstrated that kisspeptin restores LH pulsatility in women with hypothalamic amenorrhoea and can potently...