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Context: Patients with primary aldosteronism (PA) have higher cardiac comorbidities including more pronounced left ventricular hypertrophy than patients with essential hypertension., Objective: Autonomous cortisol cosecretion (ACS) is a common subtype in PA associated with a worse metabolic profile., Hypothesis: Autonomous cortisol cosecretion may affect myocardial parameters and result in a worse cardiac outcome compared to patients with PA and without ACS., Methods: Three hundred and sixty-seven patients with PA undergoing 1 mg dexamethasone suppression test (DST) and echocardiography at baseline from 2 centers of the German Conn's Registry were included. Follow-up for up to 3.8 years was available in 192 patients., Results: Patients with PA and ACS had higher NT-proBNP levels at baseline compared to patients with PA without ACS (114 vs 75.6 pg/mL, P = .02), but showed no difference in echocardiography values. NT-proBNP levels showed a significant positive correlation (r = 0.141, P = .011) with cortisol levels after DST at baseline. In response to therapy of PA, NT-proBNP levels decreased, but remained significantly higher in patients with ACS compared to patients without ACS. At follow-up, left ventricle end-diastolic dimension (LVEDD) decreased significantly only in patients without ACS. Left atrial diameter (LAD) decreased significantly in patients without ACS and in female patients with ACS but not in male patients. Left ventricular mass index (LVMI) significantly improved in female patients without ACS but remained unchanged in female patients with ACS as well as in male patients at follow-up., Conclusions: In patients with PA, concomitant ACS is associated with a worse cardiac profile and only partial recovery even years after initiation of targeted PA therapy., Competing Interests: Conflict of interest: F.B. serves as incoming editor-in-chief of the European Journal of Endocrinology. The other authors declare that there is no conflict of interest that could be perceived as prejudicing the impartiality of the research reported., (© The Author(s) 2024. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of European Society of Endocrinology. All rights reserved. For commercial re-use, please contact reprints@oup.com for reprints and translation rights for reprints. All other permissions can be obtained through our RightsLink service via the Permissions link on the article page on our site—for further information please contact journals.permissions@oup.com.)

The bulge of hair follicles harbors Nestin + (neural crest like) stem cells, which exhibit the potential to generate various cell types including melanocytes. In this study, we aimed to determine the role of Sox9, an important regulator during neural crest development, in melanocytic differentiation of those adult Nestin + cells. Immunohistochemical analysis after conditional Sox9 deletion in Nestin + cells of adult mice revealed that Sox9 is crucial for melanocytic differentiation of these cells and that Sox9 acts as a fate determinant between melanocytic and glial fate. A deeper understanding of factors that regulate fate decision, proliferation and differentiation of these stem cells provides new aspects to melanoma research as melanoma cells share many similarities with neural crest cells. In summary, we here show the important role of Sox9 in melanocytic versus glial fate decision of Nestin + stem cells in the skin of adult mice., Competing Interests: All authors declare that the submitted work was carried out in the presence of any personal, professional or financial relationships that could potentially be construed as a conflict of interest., (© 2023 The Author(s).)

The skin of adult mammals protects from radiation, physical and chemical insults. While melanocytes and melanocyte-producing stem cells contribute to proper skin function in healthy organisms, dysfunction of these cells can lead to the generation of malignant melanoma-the deadliest type of skin cancer. Addressing cells of the melanocyte lineage in vivo represents a prerequisite for the understanding of melanoma on cellular level and the development of preventive and treatment strategies. Here, the inducible Cre-loxP-system has emerged as a promising tool to specifically target, monitor, and modulate cells in adult mice. Re-analysis of existing sequencing data sets of melanocytic cells revealed that genes with a known function in neural cells, including neural stem cells (Aldh1L1 and Nestin), are also expressed in melanocytic cells. Therefore, in this study, we explored whether the promoter activity of Nestin and Aldh1L1 can serve to target cells of the melanocyte lineage using the inducible CreER T2 -loxP-system. Using an immunohistochemical approach and different time points of analysis, we were able to map the melanocytic fate of recombined stem cells in the adult hair follicle of Nestin-CreER T2 and Aldh1L1-CreER T2 transgenic mice. Thus, we here present two new mouse models and propose their use to study and putatively modulate adult melanocytic cells in vivo., (© 2022 The Authors. Pigment Cell & Melanoma Research published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd.)