Date of Award

6-2018

Document Type

Union College Only

Degree Name

Bachelor of Science

Department

Biology

First Advisor

Brian Cohen

Language

English

Keywords

Osteoclasts, FSH, Osteoporosis, RAW264.7, Bone Health, Menopause, Estrogen, Sex Hormones

Abstract

Osteoporosis can be a devastating illness which causes large losses of both monetarily and in terms of quality of life. Interestingly, two of the major risk factors for developing osteoporosis are age and gender as osteoporosis commonly affects postmenopausal women. For decades, osteoporosis was thought be driven by estrogen loss following menopause, however recent research has shown that FSH, the upstream endocrine regulator of estrogen, drives the development of this disease. Using RAW 264.7 cells, we tested the changes that FSH induces in preosteoclastic cells. We noted significant changes in kinase activation and ROS production in an FSH-dependant manner. Similarly, FSH induced gross morphological changes in this cell line.

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