Nonlinear analysis and prediction of pulsatile hormone secretion Available to Purchase

Pulsatile hormone secretion is observed in almost every hormonal system. The frequency of episodic hormone release ranges from approximately 10 to 100 pulses in 24 hours. This temporal mode of secretion is an important feature of intercellular information transfer in addition to a dose‐response dependent regulation. It has been demonstrated in a number of experiments that changes in the temporal pattern of pulsatile hormone secretion specifically regulate cellular and organ function and structure. Recent evidence links osteoporosis, a disease characterized by loss of bone mass and structure, to changes in the dynamics of pulsatile parathyroid hormone (PTH) secretion. In our study we applied nonlinear and linear time series prediction to characterize the secretory dynamics of PTH in both healthy human subjects and patients with osteoporosis. Osteoporotic patients appear to lack periods of high predictability found in normal humans. In contrast to patients with osteoporosis patients with hyperparathyroidism, a condition which despite sometimes reduced bone mass has a preserved bone architecture, show periods of high predictability of PTH secretion. Using stochastic surrogate data sets which match certain statistical properties of the original time series significant nonlinear determinism could be found for the PTH time series of a group of healthy subjects. Using classical nonlinear analytical techniques we could demonstrate that the irregular pattern of pulsatile PTH secretion in healthy men exhibits characteristics of deterministic chaos. Pulsatile secretion of PTH in healthy subjects seems to be a first example of nonlinear determinism in an apparently irregular hormonal rhythm in human physiology.