Researchers at the University of Sheffield have developed a long-acting growth hormone for use in human therapy.
The new discovery could mean that children and adults with growth hormone disorders will not have to have injections as often, reducing the need for daily treatments.
Most hormones and cytokines have a short life and therefore require frequent injections as therapy. However, the new technology developed by the multidisciplinary team at Sheffield, means that scientists and clinicians are able to generate effective, long-acting hormones which promote growth over a minimum of ten days, after just one injection.
The research, published in the prestigious journal Nature Medicine, shows that the hormones are able to act for longer because of unique characteristics in the new molecules created in Sheffield.
Hormones normally circulate in blood attached to binding proteins that prevent their clearance from the circulation and prolong their biological action. The new molecules created by the scientists, however, are able to bind to each other in a head-to-tail configuration, doubling their molecular mass in the bloodstream. This delays their absorption and elimination from the blood and therefore generates a hormone that will last for a longer period of time.