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Stories about oral versions of growth hormone have going around since supplements manufacturers started selling ineffective growth hormone sprays, powders and pills. All the stories are nonsense – probably including the rumours about mysterious Chinese growth hormone pills. But chemists at a laboratory in California have announced a breakthrough in the development of an oral growth hormone product. It works in rats.
If you need growth hormone and you don’t like injections, you’ve got a problem. Growth hormone is a protein hormone that breaks down quickly, which means you have to inject it daily. Athletes who use growth hormone for doping purposes usually inject several times a day. That’s why researchers have been working on an oral version of growth hormone for a while. It’s a challenge, because the human digestive system cuts proteins up into little pieces whenever it gets the chance. And growth hormone is no exception.
The researchers will publish an article soon in the Journal of Controlled Release in which they describe how they have solved this problem. They attached the GH molecule to the protein transferrin. Transferrin occurs naturally in the body. It transports iron. The top illustration shows the molecular structure of transferrin, and the lower illustration shows the structure of human growth hormone.
Transferrin carries growth hormone through the gut cells into the body, the researchers discovered when they did experiments with cells in a test tube. In the next stage of the experiment they gave the growth hormone to rats that had no pituitary gland and therefore could not manufacture their own growth hormone.
The researchers conclude that it is possible to make an oral GH preparation by attaching growth hormone to transferrin molecules. This approach is doubly attractive to pharmaceutical manufacturers because the researchers have shown that you can produce readymade new analogues with genetically modified cells.
The research was paid for by Pfizer.
Source:
J Control Release. 2009 Sep 15.
If you need growth hormone and you don’t like injections, you’ve got a problem. Growth hormone is a protein hormone that breaks down quickly, which means you have to inject it daily. Athletes who use growth hormone for doping purposes usually inject several times a day. That’s why researchers have been working on an oral version of growth hormone for a while. It’s a challenge, because the human digestive system cuts proteins up into little pieces whenever it gets the chance. And growth hormone is no exception.
The researchers will publish an article soon in the Journal of Controlled Release in which they describe how they have solved this problem. They attached the GH molecule to the protein transferrin. Transferrin occurs naturally in the body. It transports iron. The top illustration shows the molecular structure of transferrin, and the lower illustration shows the structure of human growth hormone.
Transferrin carries growth hormone through the gut cells into the body, the researchers discovered when they did experiments with cells in a test tube. In the next stage of the experiment they gave the growth hormone to rats that had no pituitary gland and therefore could not manufacture their own growth hormone.
The researchers conclude that it is possible to make an oral GH preparation by attaching growth hormone to transferrin molecules. This approach is doubly attractive to pharmaceutical manufacturers because the researchers have shown that you can produce readymade new analogues with genetically modified cells.
The research was paid for by Pfizer.
Source:
J Control Release. 2009 Sep 15.
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