Katarzyna Jucha, Dorota Bartusik-Aebisher and David Aebisher
Medical College of The University of Rzeszów, Poland

Part of the book: The Biochemical Guide to Hormones

Abstract

The main form of prolactin found in the pituitary gland is prolactin with a mass of 23 kDa. The 16 kDa prolactin is a product of the enzymatic activity of kallikrein and is believed to be due to proteolytic cleavage. Prolactin can be detected in the cells of the mammary gland epithelium during lactation, as well as in the milk itself, which comes from the pituitary gland and reaches the mammary gland through circulation. In addition to the uptake of prolactin from the blood, the mammary epithelial cells of lactating animals are capable of self-synthesizing prolactin. Prolactin is a common mediator of the immunoneuroendocrine network where the nervous, endocrine and immune systems communicate with each other. Recent studies show that prolactin stimulates mitogenesis in both normal T cells and the Nb2 lymphoma cell line (1622). Since in most cases the secretory response of prolactin (i.e., stimulation or inhibition) differs with the type of stress, a uniform mechanism of the influence of stress conditions on secretion of this hormone cannot be described.

Keywords: prolactin, tumor necrosis factor (TNF), Sjögren’s syndrome, systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE), rheumatoid arthritis (RA)

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