Origins of the Field of Molecular Endocrinology: A Personal Perspective.

In the first half of the 20th century, endocrinology was a physiological discipline that was based on the assumption that a limited number of hormones exist and that a hormone is produced and released from one organ and travels to a distant site(s) to impart a select hormonal physiology. Very little research was done on the mechanism of action of these hormones (1). In the intervening decades, the field of endocrinology experienced an explosion of growth with the realization that hundreds of hormones exist, many still to be recognized, and that they exert their diverse molecular regulatory actions in cells to also effect numerous paracrine and autocrine physiologies and pathologies. Within this experimental and temporal framework, the field of molecular endocrinology was born.