Transgender hormone therapy (male-to-female) males is associated with higher serum estrogen. Both estrogen and testosterone help to stimulate bone formation, especially during puberty. Estrogen is the predominant sex hormone that slows bone loss, even in men. In spite of the induction of breast development, transgender women who undergo HRT do not have an increased risk of breast cancer. Only a handful of cases of breast cancer have ever been described in transgender women who have undergone male-to-female HRT. This is in accordance with research in cisgender men in which gynecomastia has been found not to be associated with an increased risk of breast cancer,
Male a female. The part of the Y-chromosome which is responsible for maleness is the sex-determining region of the Y-chromosome, the SRY. The SRY activates Sox9, which forms feedforward loops with FGF9 and PGD2 in the gonads, allowing the levels of these genes to stay high enough in order to cause male development; for example, Fgf9 is responsible for development of the spermatic cords and the multiplication of Sertoli cells, both of which are crucial to male sexual development. The ZW sex-determination system, where males have a ZZ (as opposed to ZW) sex chromosome may be found in birds and some