Urocortin in pregnancy

The aim of this study was to investigate the possibility that urocortin is the ligand that displaces corticotropin-releasing hormone from its binding protein in the maternal circulation during pregnancy and, if so, to determine whether urocortin, like corticotropin-releasing hormone, is synthesized in substantial quantities in the placenta.

A radioimmunoassay specific for urocortin was developed and used for measurement of the peptide in chorionic villi and fetal membranes (amnion and chorion) from normal and preeclamptic pregnancies. These tissues were also assayed for corticotropin-releasing hormone. Assays for urocortin were also carried out on normal term pregnant and nonpregnant myometrium and on plasma from nonpregnant individuals, and assays for both peptides were performed on sequential normal pregnancy plasma samples taken from mid gestation until term.

Corticotropin-releasing hormone was present in normal term (1904 +/- 489 pg/g) and preeclamptic placentas (5897 +/- 1526 pg/g) and in normal term fetal membranes (645 +/- 155 pg/g, n = 6 in all cases). Urocortin was not detected in any of the tissues studied, nor was it found in the normal human plasma samples. Unlike the situation for corticotropin-releasing hormone, no pregnancy-related pattern was seen for urocortin in the plasma from pregnant women.

Urocortin is not translated to any great extent in the pregnancy tissues investigated, nor is it present in the circulation of pregnant women in detectable amounts. Furthermore, it is unlikely that urocortin is responsible for the high maternal plasma levels of free corticotropin-releasing hormone circulating in the latter stages of pregnancy, but this does not preclude the possibility that another, as yet uncharacterized, corticotropin-releasing hormone-like peptide may be.