CLINICAL STUDIES WITH PITUITARY ADRENOCORTICOTROPIN

Abstract

In 1924 Evans (25) reported that the injection of anterior pituitary extract was followed by adrenal hypertrophy. Smith (61, 62) in 1926 demonstrated that hypophysectomy induced atrophy of the adrenal cortex and that implantation of living hypophyseal tissue was followed by restoration of the gland to normal. These classical experiments established without doubt the specific tropic influence of the anterior pituitary on adrenal cortical function. Isolation of the adrenocorticotropic principle from anterior pituitary gland extract was reported by Collip in 1933 (15). In 1940 a somewhat simpler mode of preparation was described by Bates et al. (8). Further purification of the adrenocorticotropic hormone was accomplished by Evans and his group in California and Long and Sayers and their collaborators in New Haven. The former group worked with sheep pituitaries; whereas the latter used hog pitiiitaries. In 1943 Li et al. (41), employing a salt fractionation method, and Sayers et al. (56), using isoelectric precipitation, published detailed accounts of their methods of preparing pure adrenocorticotropin. Although this particular hormone was derived from pituitaries of different species and prepared by different methods in the two laboratories, the preparations appeared to be identical by the criteria employed.