Hormonal Harmony

Like a musician that gets recognised for their one-hit-wonder but wants you to appreciate their much more meaningful back-catalogue, oxytocin is known for popping up during moments of intimate enjoyment but actually influences physiological processes behind everything from childbirth to social interaction. A study to better understand the hormone’s production and release examined tissue from the hypothalamus brain region of mice (pictured, with oxytocin-producing neurons coloured). Oxytocin is released directly into the brain through the dendrites – the cells’ long tendrils – when calcium is absorbed. The study showed this uptake is dictated by physical properties of the liquid around the cells, and that it was possible to activate receptors within the dendrites to boost calcium uptake regardless of the surrounding environment. Oxytocin-based treatments often struggle to reach the brain, so this finding could point to new approaches that improve efficacy, and help many mental health conditions.

Written by Anthony Lewis

Anthony Lewis

Writer

Ant was the web editor in the early days of BPoD, and has since worked with the UK’s top science organisations as a writer and multimedia producer. He now splits his time between freelance work and managing multimedia at The Lancet.

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• Image from work by Wanhui Sheng and colleagues
• Department of Pharmacodynamics, College of Pharmacy, University of Florida, Gainesville, FL, USA
• Image originally published with a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0)
• Published in eLife, July 2021