Abstract
IT has been suggested that a sympathetic tone existing in the hypothalamus plays an important part in the mechanisms which regulate gonadotrophin secretion. The secretions of luteinizing hormone and luteotrophic hormone in rats were seen to be altered1,2, probably through effects on their respective hypothalamic factors, by agents which depleted the hypothalamic catecholamines. Prevention of the central depleting effects of these drugs caused blockade of their effects on gonadotrophin secretion. Interference in gonadotrophin secretion was observed after the administration of agents which caused a depletion of the hypothalamic catecholamines through either a catecholamine-releasing action or an inhibition of catecholamine synthesis. There appeared to be a relationship between the hypothalamic catecholamines and gonadotrophin secretion, and the rates of synthesis, uptake and/or release of the catecholamines seemed to be more critical than the absolute concentration of the amines. Recently, Alleva et al.3 have reported that in the hamster the monoamine oxidase inhibitors tranylcypromine and iproniazid cause inhibitions of ovulation which seem to vary with the concentration of serotonin in the brain rather than the brain level of catecholamines. This study was undertaken to explain more fully the relationship between hypothalamic amines and gonadotrophin secretion in the hamster.
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LIPPMANN, W. Relationship between Hypothalamic Norepinephrine and Serotonin and Gonadotrophin Secretion in the Hamster. Nature 218, 173–174 (1968). https://doi.org/10.1038/218173a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/218173a0
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