THE EXPERIMENTAL ADRENOGENITAL SYNDROME IN THE FROG*

Abstract

The urinary mesonephros, adrenal cortex, urogenital ducts, and gonadal medulla all originate from the mesonephric blastema. Of the same origin are also nodes, tumors, and cancers which consist of cells resembling interstitial cells of the gonads, or adrenal cortical cells, and which sometimes are found in the sex glands or along the urogenital connection. Estrogens admd. to larval frogs cause development of hyperplastic adrenals, partly at the expense of mesonephric and gonado-medullary diffentiation. Moderate dosages of estrogens feminize genetically male frog larvae. This apparently is the effect of direct inhibition of the gonadal medulla. High dosages of estradiol produce a paradoxical masculinization of gonad development. It is concluded that this reversal of the direction of sex transformation is due to direct repression of the ovarial cortex by very high concns. of estradiol. Hypophysectomy at the early tailbud stage retards development of the adrenal cortex and of its lipid production. Even very high dosages of estradiol do not induce adrenal hyperplasia in hypophysectomized larvae, but they have a masculinizing effect on gonad development. Adrenal hyperplasia by admn. of estrogen is an indirect reaction, mediated through the hypophysis. The possible bearing of the results of these expts. on the interpretation of fetal hyperplasia of the adrenal in man, and on clinical cases of masculinization is discussed. Placental estrogens, with variations in their concn. and in fetal responsiveness, are considered to be a probable cause of congenital adrenal abnormalities in man.