STUDIES ON SULFATION FACTOR (SF) ACTIVITY OF HUMAN SERUM The variation of Serum SF with age

Journal/Book: ACTA ENDOCRINOLOGICA 36 566-576 1961. 1961;

Abstract: Department of Endocrinology and Metabolism and Department of Pediatrics Karolinska sjukhuset Stockholm ABSTRA

Keyword(s): The relationship of serum sulfation factor (SF) activity to age has been studied in groups of healthy subjects of ages 1/2 4 8 11 15 25 and 70 years. Serum SF activity was present in all subjects. The concentration of serum SF was lowest at 1/2 and 4 years rising to comparable peaks at 8 and 15 years of age. The SF activity was the same at ages 11 25 and 70 years. The role of pituitary growth hormone in the growth of animals and man is not clear. Circumstantial clinical evidence suggests that human growth hormone (HGH) is not necessary for the growth of children before the age of about four years but is important later (Seckel 1960). Accurate information about serum HGH during normal growth is scanty due to the lack of methods for the assay of this hormone in blood. The tibia test does not detect HGH-like activity in plasma from healthy subjects including growing children (Greenspan 1950; Gemzell 1959). The recently introduced immunochemical method may permit the determination of plasma HGH in normal humans but has not yet been used for the examination of the variation of Serum HC=H with age (Read & Bryan 1960). It has been recently demonstrated that the determination of the sulfation factor (SF) activity of human Serum is a measure of growth hormone activity (Daughaday et al. 1959; Almqvist et al. 1961). Preliminary results with the SF assay showed that the serum SF level varied with age (Almqvist 1960 b). The aim of the present work was to examine the serum SF activity in relation to age. For this purpose SF activity was measured in prepubescent and pubescent children and adults. ___MH

Zurück | Weiter