Extrahypophyseal distribution of alpha-melanocyte stimulating hormone (alpha-MSH)-like immunoreactivity in postmortem brains from normal subjects and Alzheimer-type dementia patients.

Using a sensitive double-antibody solid-phase enzyme immunoassay method alpha-melanocyte stimulating hormone-like immunoreactivity (alpha-MSH-LI) was measured in 21 regions of postmortem brains from 8 normal subjects and 5 patients with Alzheimer-type dementia (ATD). In the brains from the normal subjects, the highest concentration of alpha-MSH-LI was found in the hypothalamus. Relatively high concentration were also measured in the locus coeruleus, substantia innominata, substantia nigra, amygdala and medial nucleus of thalamus. alpha-MSH-LI in other regions was approximately 1/100 of the hypothalamic content. This data is consistent with the existence of alpha-MSH in extrahypophyseal regions and indicates its regional distribution in the human brain. In the Alzheimer brains, although the temporal cortex and hippocampus had normal concentrations of alpha-MSH-LI, the cingulate cortex, caudate and substantia nigra showed significantly lower concentrations of alpha-MSH-LI than those of the control brains. This data suggests that further studies of alpha-MSH content in a larger number of ATD brains would be useful.