Effect of castration and administration of estrogen on the H3-leucine uptake by adenohypophysial cells.

The function of pituitary has been studied by various methods, including the measurement of its hormone content, the cytological and histochemical observations, the use of the electron microscopy and the fiuorescent antibodies. Several workers have recently carried out autoradiographic studies using tritium labelled aminoacids such as H3leucine,-glycine, or -methionine to investigate protein production at the cellular level (Caro, 1961; Caro and Palade, 1964; Siperstein, 1963; Warshawsky et al., 1963; Kobayashi et al., 1965). The rate of protein(hormone) production by various cells of the anterior hypophysis in vivo(Siperstein, 1963) and in vitro(Kobayashi et al., 1965) has been reported using autoradiographic techniques. In this report, tritium labelled aiminoacid was used to study the effects of castration and estrogen on the protein production of the anterior pituitary at the cellular level in vivo.The uptake rate of aminoacid by various cell types of the rat puititary was analysed by autoradiography and the results obtained so far will be described.