Guest Editorial: Special Issue on Pediatric Pituitary

From a physiologic point of view, the somatic tasks that are unique to the first two decades of life are linear growth, primarily due to bone lengthening, and sexual maturation. The key control centre for both of these processes is the pituitary, the smallest, most complex and most fragile of all discrete multifunctional endocrine glands. Arguably, our understanding of the phylogeny of the pituitary and, in particular, the evolutionary pathways leading to its situation as a unitary ductless secretory organ in chordates, has progressed minimally since a seminal review in 1924 [1]. In addition, as briefly reviewed in Chapter 2, longstanding controversies in clinical diagnosis and treatment of childhood pituitary disorders remain unresolved. However, over the past few years, advances in molecular genetics have contributed to a burgeoning understanding of both normal and abnormal pituitary function. This special issue of Pituitary is intended to provide an overview of the pituitary as it pertains to pediatric medicine. The issue begins with a short historical introduction authored by Dr. Solomon Kaplan, a pioneer in pediatric endocrine research. Clinical controversies and the interesting condition of pituitary gigantism are then briefly discussed, before moving into a focus on recent progress in molecular biology, with sections authored by leading investigators in their respective fields. We wish to express our gratitude to the authors for their contributions of time, effort and knowledge, both in the preparation of this issue and, more importantly, in furthering our understanding of pituitary physiology. We also thank Dr. Shlomo Melmed for the invitation to prepare this issue.