A subchronic application period of glucocorticoids leads to rat cognitive dysfunction whereas physostigmine induces a mild neuroprotection.

The cholinergic neurotransmitter system and prolonged glucocorticoid-induced stress can affect cognitive functions in opposite ways. While pharmacological enhancement of cholinergic neurotransmission is known to induce neuroprotective effects, chronic glucocorticoids impair cognitive functions. Up to now, there is no consensus as to whether a subchronic stress period of several days would affect cognitive function.

Negative association between plasma cortisol levels and aggression in a high-risk community sample of adolescents.

In this study, the association of aggressive behavior and personality traits with plasma cortisol levels was investigated in a high-risk community sample of adolescents. Plasma cortisol levels were collected in 245 fifteen-year-olds (118 males, 127 females) from an epidemiological cohort study of children at risk for psychopathology. Additionally, measures of reactive and proactive aggression, externalizing behavior and callous-unemotional together with impulsive personality features were assessed.

Cortisol metabolism in depressed patients and healthy controls.

Background: Chronic stress as well as major depressive disorders are associated with hypercortisolemia and impaired hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenocortical axis functioning. The aim of this study was to determine whether in major depression changes in the activity patterns of local modulators of glucocorticoid action might contribute to an increase in cortisol bioavailability and if they change during antidepressant treatment and clinical response.

Methods: Concentrations of urinary total cortisol (UFF), urinary total cortisone (UFE), tetrahydrocortisone (THE), tetrahydrocortisol (THF) and allo-THF (5alpha-THF) were measured in 10-hour nocturnal urine samples of 19 depressed patients and 15 healthy controls.

Reduction in rat phosphatidylethanolamine binding protein-1 (PEBP1) after chronic corticosterone treatment may be paralleled by cognitive impairment: a first study.

Chronic stress is associated with hippocampal atrophy and cognitive dysfunction. This study investigates how long-lasting administration of corticosterone as a mimic of experimentally induced stress affects psychometric performance and the expression of the phosphatidylethanolamine binding protein (PEBP1) in the adult hippocampus of one-year-old male rats. Psychometric investigations were conducted in rats before and after corticosterone treatment using a holeboard test system.

Thyroid cysts: a new extra-adrenal site of aldosterone synthase expression and increased aldosterone content.

Background: The rapid re-accumulation of fluid following aspiration of thyroid cystic lesions suggests that active transport of sodium and water may be involved in volume regulation of these lesions. In this study we address the possibility that aldosterone may take part in this process.

Subjects And Methods: Thirty-one patients (29 women and two men), with a mean age of 52.

Chronic corticosterone-induced deterioration in rat behaviour is not paralleled by changes in hippocampal NF-kappaB-activation.

We investigated whether long-lasting stress induced by chronic glucocorticoid (GC) exposure affects activation of brain NF-kappaB and whether these changes are related to functional deterioration and structural changes in the rat hippocampus. Psychometric investigations were conducted using a holeboard test system in 28 one-year-old male Wistar rats. Thereafter, rats were divided into three groups for daily administration of 10 mg corticosterone (treatment) or sesame oil (placebo = sham control for effects of the vehicle) for 60 days.

Kallidin-like peptide mediates the cardioprotective effect of the ACE inhibitor captopril against ischaemic reperfusion injury of rat heart.

1. The potential cardioprotective effect of ACE inhibitors has been attributed to the inhibition of bradykinin degradation. Recent data in rats documented a kallidin-like peptide, which mimics the cardioprotective effect of ischaemic preconditioning.

A kallidin-like peptide is a protective cardiac kinin, released by ischaemic preconditioning of rat heart.

Bradykinin is thought to play a major role among the endogenous cardioprotective candidates of ischaemic preconditioning (IPC). Little attention has been paid to the fact that in the tissue kallidin (KAL), rather than bradykinin might be the physiological mediator of the kallikrein-kinin system. In order to evaluate the importance of one or the other peptide the release and effect of both kinins has been investigated in isolated rat hearts following IPC.

Rat tissue kallikrein releases a kallidin-like peptide from rat low-molecular-weight kininogen.

The kallikrein-kinin system is subdivided into the plasma and tissue-kallikrein-kinin system, with bradykinin (BK) and kallidin (KAL) (Lys(0)-bradykinin) as functional peptides. This occurs in both humans and other mammals. Both peptides are released by plasma and tissue-kallikrein.

A particular phenotype in a girl with aldosterone synthase deficiency.

Aldosterone synthase deficiency (ASD) usually presents in infancy as a life-threatening electrolyte imbalance. A 4-wk-old child of unrelated parents was examined for failure to thrive and salt-wasting. Notable laboratory findings were hyperkalemia, high plasma renin, and low-normal aldosterone levels.

Endocrine disorders of sodium regulation. Role of adrenal steroids in genetic defects causing sodium loss or sodium retention.

Salt and water homoeostasis is tightly regulated by a variety of control mechanisms with the adrenal steroid hormone aldosterone playing a central role. Defects or disturbances in these systems lead to either salt loss, which is life threatening in the neonatal period, or sodium retention causing hypertension. Rapid and accurate diagnosis is required to avoid severe complications.

Association of testosterone and dihydrotestosterone with externalizing behavior in adolescent boys and girls.

Background: While an association between androgens and different types of aggression has been well documented in male offenders, the influence of androgens on externalizing behavior in adolescents at risk for antisocial behavior has not been investigated so far.

Methods: Plasma levels of the main androgen metabolites testosterone (T) and 5alpha-dihydrotestosterone (DHT) were measured in N = 87 fourteen-year-old (36 boys, 51 girls) from a prospective longitudinal study of children at risk. Externalizing behavior at age 8, 11 and 14 was assessed using the Achenbach Child Behavior Checklist (CBCL) and Teacher Report Form (TRF).

Cortisol and cortisone in human follicular fluid and serum and the outcome of IVF treatment.

Background: The glucocorticoid status of ovarian follicular fluid has been linked to oocyte quality. The aim of this study was to examine whether the concentrations of cortisone and cortisol and their calculated ratios in the follicular fluid and serum samples are predictive of IVF outcome.

Methods: In the prospective study of 387 patients (420 treatment cycles) undergoing IVF treatment the concentrations of cortisone and cortisol were measured with specific assays, and their calculated ratios in the follicular fluid and serum samples obtained after ovarian stimulation and induced ovulation were determined.

Urinary tetrahydroaldosterone as a screening method for primary aldosteronism: a comparative study.

Background: The major aldosterone metabolite 3 alpha,5 beta tetrahydroaldosterone reflects up to 45% of the aldosterone secretion. Its 24-h urinary excretion is likely to provide an accurate index of the daily aldosterone production and to be an indicator for primary aldosteronism (PA).

Methods: In a prospective study, the validity of tetrahydroaldosterone as a screening test for PA was evaluated in comparison to serum potassium, plasma aldosterone, plasma renin activity, plasma aldosterone/renin activity ratio (PARR), as well as 24-h urinary aldosterone-18-glucuronide and free aldosterone.

Regulatory effects of salt diet on renal renin-angiotensin-aldosterone, and kallikrein-kinin systems.

The interaction of the renin-angiotensin-aldosterone system (RAAS) and the kallikrein-kinin system (KKS) was investigated in rats fed on a low, normal, and high-salt diet for 2 weeks. At the beginning of the second week, either a B2-receptor antagonist (icatibant), or an AT1-receptor antagonist (losartan), or an aldosterone receptor antagonist (spironolactone) was applied via osmotic pump delivering a constant amount of drug for 7 days. The urinary bradykinin (BK) levels corresponded with increasing NaCl diet and the activity of urinary kallikrein.