Effects of Sexual Hormones on the Adrenergic Innervation and the Monoamine Oxidase Activity in the Rat Ventral Prostate

Intact and castrated rats were injected intramuscularly with polyoestradiol phosphate, (PEP), (estradurin®), 8 mg/kg, or with vehicle. Other rats were castrated and injected intramuscularly with testosterone‐hexyloxyphenyl‐propionate (A), (andradurin®), 60 mg/kg, alone or in combination with PEP. After 20 days the adrenergic innervation of the ventral prostate was studied histochemically. It was found that the normally sparse innervation, restricted to the stroma, was markedly increased by those treatments which reduced the androgenic influence on the prostate. This increased innervation was accompanied by an increase of histochemically and biochemically demonstrable monoamine oxidase (MAO).