Androgenized females

Drickamer, L. C., 1974a, Contact stimulation, androgenized females and accelerated sexual maturation in female mice, Behav. Biol., 12 101. 

Female sexual development and behaviour in mammals occurs by default and requires no ovarian secretion, and it is only in genetic males that the testis can secrete hormones which destroy this female pattern and superimpose that of the male. Sexual differentiation is not so well defined in fish, and larval exposure to both synthetic estrogens and androgens is widely used in aquaculture to produce monosex cultures. Endocrine disruption of sexual differentiation in fish may therefore reflect both the complexity and diversity of such processes between different species. Some care is required in use of the terms hermaphrodite and sex-reversal since a true hermaphrodite has both functional testes and ovaries and a sex-reversed fish is fully functional as its final sex—both produce the appropriate viable gametes. Such functional sex-reversal is not possible in mammals, but in some species of fish it is the normal developmental pattern. In most of the cases of hermaphroditism or sex-reversal reported in the non-scientific press, there is evidence only for a few ovarian follicles within a functional testis. This may be considered as feminisation or a form of intersex, and is very clearly endocrine disruption, but it is certainly neither sex-reversal nor hermaphroditism. In some cases the terms have even been used to infer induction of a single female characteristic such as production of yolk-protein by males. 

The mechanism by which TBT causes these effects has been extensively stiidied. The androgenic effects of TBT appear to be caused by interference with steroid biosynthesis rather than by mimicking the action of testosterone at the androgen receptor. Exposure of female molluscs to TBT leads to an elevation in testosterone in the haemolymph. " Much of the experimental evidence... 

Cyproterone acetate (CPA) is a progestational antiandrogen that blocks the androgen receptors. It is combined with ethinyl estradiol in an oral contraceptive formulation, which is indicated in female acne patients with a high level of seborrhea, therapy resistant papulo-pustular acne or acne conglobata not responding to other treatments. 

Significant amounts of estrogens are produced by the peripheral aromatization of androgens. In human males, the peripheral aromatization of testosterone to estradiol (Ej) accounts for 80% of the production of the latter. In females, adrenal androgens are important... 

Inexperienced males deprived of the VNO prior to mating do not respond on initial exposure to females — they do not vocalise or show T. surges (Wysocki, 1983). Androgen output in these conditions is not affected by the MOS or by visual cues, suggesting that in naive mice the AOS-mediated chemosignals are processed unmodified, and so... 

Fig. 5.9(b) Sex differences in responsiveness to female hamster vaginal fluid (FHVS) androgen (T) effects on central transmission pathways (from Swann and Fiber, 1997). 

Oral contraceptives are a valuable second-line treatment option for moderate to severe acne in female patients. Oral contraceptives decrease the production of androgens by the ovaries, which in turn leads to a decrease in sebum production.3,16... 

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