Synergistic Action of Prolactin With HCG on Rat Ventral Prostate

Abstract

The increase in the weights of the ventral prostate and other accessory sex organs of the immature rat has been employed as an end point for estimating the biological potency of preparations of LH and HCG (Greep et al., 1941(Greep et al., , 1942Diczfalusy & Loraine, 1955). Several investigators have claimed that prolactin alone or synergistically with androgens has a role in the growth of the male accessory sex organs (Segaloff et al., 1956;Chase et al., 1957;Antliff et al., 1960;Bengmark & Hesselsjo, 1963, 1964Okamoto et al., 1967;Dorfman, 1972;Negro-Vilar et al., 1973). In these studies, large amounts of prolactin were used, and the possible presence of small amounts of contaminating LH could not be ruled out. It was therefore of interest to re-examine the effects of prolactin alone or with HCG on the growth of the male accessory sex glands of the rat.Biological and bioimmunological experiments were carried out (see Table 1 ) with 20-to 23-day-old immature male rats of the Holtzman strain. The HCG (Ayerst Laboratories, U.S.A.) and ovine prolactin (NIH-P-S10) were administered subcutaneously to rats once a day on 3 consecutive days, at approximately 24-hr intervals while control animals received saline or normal rabbit serum. In the bioimmunological experiments, one group of animals received a mixture of ovine prolactin and the antiserum to ovine prolactin, which was incubated at 37\g=deg\C for 1\ m=1/ 2\ hr. The preparation and specificity of this antiserum has been described elsewhere Thakur et al., 1975

Autoradiographic Localization of the Binding of 125i-Labelled Prolactin to Rat Tissues in Vitro

“…1975; Lax, Ghraf, Schriefers, Herrmann & Petutschnigk, 1976), the adrenal gland (Witorsch & Edwards, 1976), the prostate gland (Chase, Geshwind & Bern, 1957;Dattatreymurty, Raghaven, Purandare, Sheth & Rao, 1975), the ovary (Tomogane, Ota & Yokoyama, 1975), the testis (Bartke & Dalterio, 1976), and the kidney (Lockett & Nail, 1965) (see also Horrobin (1975) for a review).…”