Human Growth and Growth Hormone: From Antiquity to the Recominant Age to the Future.

ABSTRACT: Since antiquity Man has been fascinated by the variations in human (and animal) growth. Stories and art abound about giants and little people. Modern genetics have solved some of etiologies at both extremes of growth. Serious study began with the pathophysiology of acromegaly followed by early attempts at treatment culminating in modern endoscopic surgery and multiple pharmacologic agents. Virtually at the same time experiments with the removal of the pituitary from laboratory animals noted the slowing or stopping of linear growth and then over a few decades the extraction and purification of a protein within the anterior pituitary that restored, partially or in full, the animal's growth. Human growth hormone was purified decades after those from large animals and it was noted that it was

SUBMITTER: Graber E 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC8287422 | biostudies-literature | 2021

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature