John Jacob Abel the position of chair of the department until he retired at the age of 75 in 1932. Ever since his early years in Europe, Abel showed great interest in isolating pure form of internal gland hormones. The first work that led to his international reputation as a pharmacologist and biochemist was the isolation of epinephrine from adrenal medulla. However, he was only able to isolate a monobenzoyl derivative of epinephrine. While he was improving his processes on decomposing the benzoyl derivative to obtain salts of epinephrine using saponification, a Japanese chemist J. Takamine, who had visited his lab, was able
Melanin-concentrating hormone when diet is controlled. It has been postulated that MCH has a modulatory role with the release of Luteinizing Hormone (LH) either by directly interacting acting on the pituitary gland or indirectly by affecting Gonadotropin-releasing hormone (GNRH) in the hypothalamus. Estrogen seems to be necessary in order for MCH to affect reproduction. Though MCH was initially discovered for its role of determining the pigmentation in fish, trying to determine MCH's role in skin pigmentation in mammals has been much more difficult to determine. However, MCHR1 has been found in human melanocytes and some melanoma cells, so MCH is able to