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The dynamics of uptake and metabolism in vitro of androgens by normal and hyperplastic human prostate glands was studied by means of a new experimental design proposed by Gurpide & Welch (1969). Prostate slices were perfused with a medium containing [(3)H]testosterone and [(14)C]androstenedione, or 5alpha-dihydro-[(3)H]testosterone and [(14)C]testosterone. The entry into the slices, the irreversible metabolism, the conversion between the compounds and the tissue retention or ;uptake' of the steroids were measured at the steady state. A similar portion of the three androgens entered the tissue and was irreversibly metabolized. Conversion of testosterone into 5alpha-dihydrotestosterone was much greater than the interconversion of testosterone and androstenedione. The prostate slices retained 5alpha-dihydrotestosterone at a concentration three times that in the medium, whereas testosterone and androstenedione were retained to a smaller extent. At a steroid concentration of 0.11mumol/l in the medium, the various parameters did not differ significantly in experiments performed with slices from normal and hyperplastic glands. When the steroid concentration in the medium was increased tenfold, however, a difference between normal and hyperplastic glands was evident. The normal glands increased the uptake and metabolism proportionally to the elevation of the steroid concentration in the medium. In the hyperplastic glands the entry and metabolism lagged behind the increase in steroid supply, whereas the tissue uptake became disproportionately high. The possible causes of this finding are discussed.

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A micro-method has been developed for the determination of \g=D\4-3-ketosteroids and \g=D\5-3\g=b\-hydroxysteroids,oestradiol-17\g=b\, oestrone and oestriol in small volumes of cyst fluid. The method consists of separation of the neutral and phenolic fractions by solvent partition; fractionation of the neutral steroids by partition and paper chromatography and of the three oestrogens by adsorption chromatography after methylation. This technique has been applied to cyst fluid from the ovaries of twenty-one patients, twelve with the Stein-Leventhal syndrome, and nine with other gynaecological disorders. In the patients with the Stein-Leventhal syndrome the steroid concentrations in cyst fluid showed a definite pattern characterized by high concentrations of \g=D\4-androstenedione, low concentrations of progesterone and 17\g=a\-hydroxyprogesterone, and small amounts or undetectable oestrogens. In cyst fluid from the ovaries of the nine control patients there were, in general, lower concentrations of \g=D\4-androstenedione and significant amounts of oestradiol-17\g=b\.High concentrations of progesterone and oestrogens were found in the cyst fluid of patients with menorrhagia and endometriosis.