Endocrine Abstracts

Reproduction is an energy-demanding function. Accordingly, acquisition of reproductive capacity at puberty is metabolically gated, as a means to prevent fertility in conditions of energy insufficiency. In addition, obesity has been shown to impact the timing of puberty and may be among the causes for the earlier trends of pubertal age reported in various countries, especially in girls but probably also in boys. The metabolic control of puberty in such a spectrum of situations,...

Glucocorticoids (GC) act at different target tissues by binding two different intracellular receptors, the glucocorticoid receptor (GR) and the mineralcorticoid receptor (MR), but the their effects vary considerably between subjects, due to a different sensitivity, which is at least partially, genetically determined. GCs are so named based on their actions on carbohydrate metabolism, namely on insulin-dependent processes. In particular, the effect of GC includes increased hepa...

GH levels decline with age and weight gain and are enhanced in response to nutrient deprivation. Under these circumstances, GH levels are negatively correlated with IGF1 and insulin levels. Since IGF1 and insulin can directly inhibit GH synthesis and release from primary pituitary cells of different species, it is commonly accepted that changes in circulating IGF1 and insulin serve to directly regulate somatotrope function in response to metabolic extremes. However, teasing ap...