PHYSIOLOGICAL REACTIONS OF THE THYROID STIMULATING HORMONE OF THE PITUITARY. II. THE EFFECT OF NORMAL AND PATHOLOGICAL HUMAN THYROID TISSUES ON THE ACTIVITY OF THE THYROID STIMULATING HORMONE

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Abstract
With tissue culture technics human thyroid tissue, normal and pathologic, was bathed in Tyrode''s soln. containing thyroid stimulating hormone for 24 hrs. The TSH containing media were removed and assayed on day old chicks. The thyrotrophic activity was detd. on measurement of the height of thyroid acinar cells under oil immersion and with a Leitz Echalon ocular micrometer. Tissue slices from non-toxic nodular goiters caused no change in the TSH activity. Explanted tissue slices of normal human thyroids removed at parathyroid operations, inactivated about 1/2 of the TSH contained in the medium. The tissue removed from thyrotoxic patients after I treatment when bathed in TSH containing medium caused almost complete inactivation of the thyrotrophic hormone. When TSH was added to the medium only after exposure of the medium to the thyroid slices there was no loss of thyrotrophic activity. The authors suggest that the increased inactivation of TSH by thyrotoxic thyroid tissue may explain the absence of thyrotrophic substances from the urine of thyrotoxic patients.