Leptin in the human stomach

Editor,—After the report in 1998 by Bado and colleagues1 describing the presence of leptin in rat stomach, we have recently reported the first evidence of leptin in the stomach mucosa of humans.2 It was shown that the cells in the lower half of the stomach glands were clearly immunoreactive for leptin, and both leptin mRNA and leptin protein in the human gastric epithelium were detected. Western blot analysis showed the presence of a 16 kDa band corresponding to leptin and a 19 kDa band which, as suggested for rats,1 could represent a leptin precursor. It was also shown that secretory granules of chief cells contain this hormone, suggesting that gastric leptin could function in the short term …