Endocrine Abstracts

Multiple endocrine neoplasia type 1 (MEN1), an autosomal dominant disorder characterised by the occurrence of parathyroid, pancreatic islet and anterior pituitary tumours, is due to mutations of a tumour suppressor gene, MEN1. MEN1 mutations have also been reported to cause familial isolated primary hyperparathyroidism (FIHP). Moreover, 15 identical MEN1 mutations have been reported to cause MEN1 or FIHP in unrelated families; thereby implicating a r...

Dent’s disease is a renal proximal tubular disorder characterised by low-molecular-weight proteinuria, glycosuria, hypercalciuria, phosphaturia, nephrolithiasis and abnormal urinary loss of other proteins which include insulin, parathyroid hormone (PTH) and vitamin D-binding protein, due to defective receptor-mediated endocytosis (RME). Mutations in CLC-5 cause Dent’s disease-1 whilst mutations in OCRL1 cause Dent’s disease-2 and the oculocerebrorenal syndrome o...

Three hundred and thirty six cases of pituitary adenomas were operated by the transpenoidal route in the last 10 years by a single surgeon. Majority of these were giant non functioning adenomas. Prolactinomas were excluded unless a part of dual adenoma.In nearly 80% of tumours, total or near total removal was achieved. Long term outcome with follow up of more than 5 years revealed recurrence requiring resurgery in only 4 out of 102 patients. Endocrine re...

Heterozygous mutations of GATA3, a dual zinc-finger transcription factor, cause the hypoparathyroidism, deafness and renal dysplasia (HDR) syndrome. To study the role of GATA3 in parathyroid function we have investigated Gata3+/− mice for hypoparathyroidism. Gata3+/− and Gata3+/+ mice were challenged at weaning with a diet low in calcium (0.001%) and vitamin D (0.0 IU/g). The low calcium-vitamin D diet led to a ...

The Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute Gene Targeting Programme is deleting all mouse genes and has already generated 400 knockout mice in a C57/BL6N background with a further 4000 genes targeted in ES cells. Two hundred and fifty new knockouts will undergo limited phenotyping each year. However, the programme lacks a sensitive and sufficiently detailed screen for individual physiological systems, each of which requires high throughput methodology and unique expertise. Thus, we p...

Investigations of skeletal dysplasias which are often inherited have yielded important insights in the molecular mechanisms of bone development, osteoporosis and osteoarthritis. However, these studies have been hampered by the lack of available patients and affected families. To overcome this limitation, we have investigated mice treated with the chemical mutagen N-ethyl-N-nitrosourea (ENU) for hereditary musculoskeletal disorders. Mice were kept in accordance wi...

Renal stone disease is a common disorder for which the underlying causes remain largely unknown. We have investigated a hereditary renal calcification mouse model, Rcalc1, that is not associated with hypercalciuria for underlying mechanisms. Kidney RNA from 30 to 33 week-old Rcalc1 and control BALB/c and C3H female mice (n=4/group) was extracted and hybridised to Mouse Genome 430 2.0 arrays (Affymetrix). Following Robust Multichip Average normalization, pair-wise compar...

Transient receptor potential cation channel, subfamily Vanilloid, member 5 (TRPV5) is a member of the TRP superfamily. TRPV5, which functions as a tetramer, is localized to apical membranes of distal convoluted tubules (DCT) and connecting tubules (CNT) of the kidney, and is involved in vitamin D-regulated calcium reabsorption. Mice with a targeted deletion of Trpv5 (Trpv5−/−) develop severe hypercalciuria, compensatory hyperabsorption of dietary ...

Abnormalities of calcium homeostasis such as secondary or tertiary hyperparathyroidism, and renal osteodystrophy often occur in patients with kidney failure. However, investigations of the underlying molecular mechanisms have been hampered by the lack of available tissues from patients and the lack of suitable animal models. We therefore sought to overcome this limitation by investigating mice treated with the chemical mutagen N-ethyl-N-nitrosourea and identified...

The mouse knockout model for multiple endocrine neoplasia type 1 (MEN1) closely resembles the phenotype of the human disorder, with frequent development of tumours of the parathyroids, pancreas and pituitary. These tumours have loss of heterozygosity (LOH) of the Men1 locus and lack expression of the encoded protein (menin).The aim of this study was to investigate the feasibility of detecting pituitary tumours in heterozygous (Men1+/−...