The identification of gonadotropin-releasing hormone (GnRH) in hypothalamic and extrahypothalamic loci of the human nervous system.

Immunoreactive-like GnRH activity has been identified in 24 of 26 separate loci of the human central nervous system. Tissues, secured from 5 brains at autopsy, were dissected, extracted sequentially with 2N and glacial acetic acid, lyophilized, and eluted in buffered saline for GnRH determinations by specific radioimmunoassay. GnRH concentrations (ng/mg protein) ranged from 8.96 (infundibulum) to 0.001 (cerebellum. middle lobe). Highest extrahypothalamic concentrations of GnRH were found in mamillary body (0.076) and thalamus (0.002). Extrahypothalamic GnRH was identical to synthetic and hypothalamic GnRH by criteria of immunoidentity. No post-mortem GnRH peptidolysis, evaluated experimentally in rats, was evident between 0 and 16 hrs in intact tissues maintained at 4 degrees C. These data suggest that GnRH is distributed throughout regions of the human brain outside the hypothalamus and suggest new, non-endocrine functions for GnRH in the human CNS, analogous the those reported recently for GnRH in experimental animals.