Takahashi K, Abe T, Matsumoto K, Tomita M
Department of Physiological Chemistry, School of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Showa University, 1-5-8, Hatanodai, Shinagawa-ku, 142-8555, Tokyo, Japan.
Neurosci Lett. 2000 Sep 22;291(3):159-62. doi: 10.1016/s0304-3940(00)01413-0.
Prolactin-releasing peptide (PrRP) and its receptor (PrRP-R) have recently been characterized and cloned. PrRP functions as a prolactin-secreting factor through binding with PrRP-R, which is extensively expressed in the human pituitary. We studied the expression of PrRP-R in human pituitary adenomas. Pituitary adenomas were collected from 13 patients by transsphenoidal resection. Six patients had prolactin-secreting adenomas, three had adrenocorticotropic hormone-secreting adenomas, one had a growth hormone -secreting adenoma, and three had non-secreting adenomas. All pituitary adenomas examined by reverse transcription-polymerase chain reaction analysis expressed PrRP-R. When semiquantitative competitive PCR was performed to determine the relative amounts of the PrRP-R mRNA expression level, there was no correlation between plasma prolactin levels and PrRP-R expression levels. These results suggest that the plasma prolactin level is regulated by means other than signal transduction through PrRP-R activation.
催乳素释放肽（PrRP）及其受体（PrRP-R）最近已得到鉴定和克隆。PrRP通过与PrRP-R结合发挥催乳素分泌因子的作用，PrRP-R在人垂体中广泛表达。我们研究了PrRP-R在人垂体腺瘤中的表达。通过经蝶窦切除术从13例患者中收集垂体腺瘤。6例患者患有催乳素分泌腺瘤，3例患有促肾上腺皮质激素分泌腺瘤，1例患有生长激素分泌腺瘤，3例患有无分泌功能腺瘤。通过逆转录-聚合酶链反应分析检测的所有垂体腺瘤均表达PrRP-R。当进行半定量竞争性PCR以确定PrRP-R mRNA表达水平的相对量时，血浆催乳素水平与PrRP-R表达水平之间无相关性。这些结果表明，血浆催乳素水平是通过PrRP-R激活以外的信号转导方式进行调节的。
