Endocrine Abstracts

The expression of GHSR, an endogenous Ghrelin receptor, has been reported in pituitary, but the levels of expression of this receptor are low and the role of the GHSR in the normal physiology to directly affect GH or Prolactin release in pituitary remains unclear. We used a line of GH-GHSR transgenic mice to analyse the effects of hGHSR over-expression in the pituitary GH cells. We also crossed these mice with GH-GFP transgenic mice with fluorescent somatotrophs.<p class="...

In addition to obesity, models of abnormal hypothalamic melanocortin signalling display increased linear growth, although the mechanism remains unclear. We have studied the somatotrophic axis in the obese agouti (Ay/a) mouse (male, 12-14 weeks), as a model of an altered melanocortin system. Somatotrophic hormones were measured by radioimmunoassay and hypothalamic neuropeptide expression studied by in situhybridisation.Obese A<...