Observations on the metabolic activity of a human placental fraction

The Effect of Human Placental Lactogen on Adipose Tissue Lipolysis

“…Dogs given daily doses of HPL showed increases in plasma FFA and blood glucose concentrations (Burt, Leake & Pruitt, 1966) and the addition of HPL to isolated rat fat-cell suspensions increased the release of FFA and glycerol into the medium (Turtle & Kipnis, 1967). These findings suggest that the promotion of adipose tissue lipolysis may be an important function of HPL during pregnancy and this paper presents the results of experiments to determine the effects of HPL on rat adipose tissue metabolism and the minimum concentration of HPL that induced lipolysis.…”

Hormones of the Placenta: hCG and hPL

“…Administration of hPL in animals leads to a rise in blood sugar (Burt et al, 1966;Handwerger et al, 1977) and free fatty acids (Riggi et al, 1966); this may be due to increased peripheral resistance to insulin action, though in hypophysectomized rats hPL can cause an increase in insulin release in vitro from islet cells (J.M. Martin and Friesen, 1969).…”

Human Chorionic Somatomamotraophin and Its Clinical Significance

“…In animals the administration of HCS produces a rise of blood sugar (Burt et al, 1966;Riggi et al, 1966) and the development of resistance to exogenous insulin (Beck, 1970). Injection of HCS into hypophysectomized rats stimulates the release of insulin in vitro from islet cells (Martin & Friesen, 1969;Malaisse et al, 1969), although Burt et al (1 966) were unable to demonstrate a rise of serum insulin-like activity following the injection of HCS in dogs.…”