Evidence for diverse structural variations of the forms of human FSH within and between pituitaries

The biological activity of FSH in vitro (B-vitro) was compared with its radioimmunological (RIA) activity in 38 pituitary extracts from men and women. The B-vitro method was based upon the estimation of oestradiol produced by cultured Sertoli cells from 10-day-old rats. The mean B-vitro/RIA ratios for FSH of men and young and elderly women were almost identical. The mean values of median charge of the forms of FSH differed significantly between the three groups of human adults. The B-vitro/RIA ratio of different forms of FSH, separated by electrophoresis of 14 individual pituitary extracts, was higher for less negatively charged than for more negatively charged forms. Some forms of FSH with the same charge and separated from different pituitary extracts, e.g. from a young and an elderly woman, had significantly different B-vitro/RIA ratios. This ratio, thus, was not related to the charge per se of the hormone. However, the relation between the B-vitro/RIA ratio and the charge of FSH was similar for individual pituitary extracts when charge was expressed in relation to median charge. The results suggest that different molecular structural variations of FSH are involved in the polymorphisms observed within and between individual pituitaries. In human adults, the variation of FSH between the pituitaries mainly affects the metabolic clearance rate (MCR) of the hormone, whereas the variation within the individual pituitary affects both the MCR of the hormone and its biological effect at the target cell.