ESPE Yearbook of Paediatric Endocrinology

Mol Cell Endocrinol. 2021 May 1;527:111218. doi: 10.1016/j.mce.2021.111218. PMID: 33636254This study used a high fat and high sucrose diet to generate obese mice. The offspring of these mice showed activation of the unfolding protein response and the heat-shock response in the hypothalamus as early as weaning. This was associated with malformed paraventricular nucleus axonal projections ...

To read the full abstract: Diabetes Care. 2019 Aug;42(8):1473–1480. PMID: 31332028Maternal obesity and gestational diabetes (GDM) increase the risk of offspring developing childhood obesity and type 2 diabetes. The underlying mechanisms and possible neuronal pathways are unknown but might involve changes in the hypothalamic structure and function. Novel non-invasive imaging te...

To read the full abstract: J Clin Invest 2020;130(4):2001–16.In this study, Perry et al used their well-established animal model of fasted rats to unravel how feeding induces hyperthermia and energy expenditure.They showed that intracerebroventricular injection of leptin normalized fasting induced low plasma epinephrine and norepinephrine levels and body temperat...

Nat Commun. 2020 Aug 13;11(1):4063. doi: 10.1038/s41467-020-17890-2. PMID: 32792525.These researchers proposed the heterogeneity of hypothalamic neural progenitor cells. Other than traditional hypothalamic radial glial (hRG) cells, which are predominantly located in the ventricular zone, there are additional basal progenitors in the mantle zone, which are named as hypothalamic mantle zo...

To read the full abstract: Cell Metab. 2019 4;29:1363–1375.Mesenchymal stem and/or stromal cells (MSCs) regulate immune system and have been associated with inflammatory and autoimmune diseases. The IGF system is mainly known for its role in the regulation of growth, development and metabolism. A possible role of IGF-I in inflammation has recently been proposed [1, 2], whereas the e...

Brief summary: In this experimental study, a transdermal polymeric microneedle (MN) patch for glucose-responsive closed-loop insulin and glucagon delivery was developed. In chemically-induced type 1 diabetes (T1D) mouse and minipig models, this glucose-responsive dual-hormone MN patch demonstrated tight regulation in blood glucose.The interplay between insulin and glucagon is essential for blood glucose regulation in individuals with or without diabetes....

Cell Stem Cell. 2022 Feb 3;29(2):328-343.e5. doi: 10.1016/j.stem.2021.11.009. PMID: 34879244.Brief Summary: By applying single-cell RNA sequencing (scRNA-seq) to 112,376 cells of human hypothalamus ranging from 7–20 gestational weeks (GW7–20), the authors produced a spatiotemporal transcriptome atlas of human hypothalamus development and revealed critical regulatory genes control...

Cell Metab 2021;33(2): 270–282.e8. doi: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cmet.2020.11.008Brestoff et al. show, for the first time, that mitochondria are transferred from adipocytes to macrophages and that this event has an impact on systemic metabolic homeostasis.Within the last years, it has been demonstrated that cells are able to communicate with each other by the exchange of organell...

To read the full abstract: Nat Med. 2019 Mar;25(3):439–447.Prenatal screening for trisomy 21, trisomy 18, trisomy 13, and sex chromosome aneuploidies can be performed using next-generation sequencing of cell-free DNA (cfDNA) in the maternal circulation. This article describes a new non-invasive prenatal screening (NIPS) approach for the detection of de novo or paternally inheri...

Brief summary: In this in vivo study, Xia et al. demonstrate that AAV-mediated gene therapy recovers testosterone levels, restarts sexual development, restores spermatogenesis, and produces fertile offspring in a mouse model of Leydig cell failure (LCF).A null mutation in the gene encoding luteinizing hormone/choriogonadotrophin receptor (Lhcgr) causes a hereditary LCF in mice which is characterized by a reduction in testosterone levels...