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The trade-off between the olfactory bulb and eyeball volume in precocious puberty

  • Murat Karaoglan EMAIL logo , Hale Colakoğlu Er , Emel Hatun Aytaç and Mehmet Keskin
Published/Copyright: January 11, 2020

Abstract

Background

The olfactory bulb (OB) and eyeball size change depending on age and puberty. There is a well-established trade-off between sensory structures of the brain such as the eye and the olfactory bulb that depend on environmental circumstances in the evolutionary history of animals.

The aim of this study was to developmentally investigate the potential reciprocal changes between OB and eyeball volumes (EV) in girls with precocious puberty (PP).

Methods

A total of 148 girls aged between 5 and 8 years (63 PP, 85 healthy) were included in the study. Exclusion criteria: Cases of anosmia/hyposmia, neurodegenerative disorder, refractive errors and trauma. The pituitary height (PH), EV and OB volumes were measured on segmentation of a magnetic resonance image (MRI) slice using manual countering. The corrected measurements by body surface were used in all statistical analyses.

Results

In girls with PP, the means of the OB volume and PH were larger (71.11 ± 20.64 mL) and higher (4.62 ± 1.18 mm), respectively, while the mean of EVs was smaller (11.24 ± 2.62 cm3) (p = 0.000). Cut-off values were 62.27 mL, 10.7 cm3 and 4.71 mm for OB volume, EV and PH, respectively. While negative correlations were found between OB volume-EV and EV-PH (r63 = −0.224, p = 0.001 and r63 = −0.116, p = 0.001, respectively), OB volume was positively correlated with PH (r63 = 0.578, p = 0.001).

Conclusions

The present study demonstrates that girls with PP have significantly larger OB volume, but smaller EV, and there is negative correlation between the two structures. These results indicate that there is trade-off between anatomical dimensions of OB and eyeball in favor of OB in PP girls.


Corresponding author: Murat Karaoglan, MD, Department of Pediatric Endocrinology, Gaziantep University Faculty of Medicine, 27070 Gaziantep, Turkey, Phone: +90-0532-4091616, Fax: +90-0342-3603928

Acknowledgments

We would like to thank Asst. Prof. İlkay Dogan assistance with statistical analyses and preparing the figures.

  1. Author contributions: All the authors have accepted responsibility for the entire content of this submitted manuscript and approved submission.

  2. Disclosure statement: The authors have nothing to disclose.

  3. Ethics consent: This study was approved by Gaziantep University Clinical Research Ethic Committee with number 10.10.2018/273.

  4. Research funding: None declared.

  5. Employment or leadership: None declared.

  6. Honorarium: None declared.

  7. Competing interests: The funding organization(s) played no role in the study design; in the collection, analysis, and interpretation of data; in the writing of the report; or in the decision to submit the report for publication.

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Article note

This study was presented as orally in ESPE2019, Vienna.


Received: 2019-09-29
Accepted: 2019-11-15
Published Online: 2020-01-11
Published in Print: 2020-02-25

©2020 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston

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