Scientific Reference
AOD-9604
Evidence profile: Predominantly preclinical
AOD-9604 is a synthetic peptide based on the C-terminal segment of human growth hormone, with a tyrosine at its N-terminus and a disulfide bond. It was designed to test the idea that this short region carries some of growth hormone's activity on fat metabolism separately from the rest of the molecule. Work on it began with rodent studies of fat cells and whole-animal lipid metabolism, and the peptide later entered human clinical trials, whose published record is sparse. A smaller body of animal work has looked at cartilage in joint injury models. Unlike full-length growth hormone, it is not regarded as a growth hormone receptor agonist, which shapes how its reported activity is interpreted.
Mechanism of Action
AOD-9604 has been reported not to bind the growth hormone receptor with meaningful affinity and not to act through the IGF-1 axis, so its proposed actions differ from those of the whole hormone. Studies in isolated rodent fat cells and in obese mice examined lipolysis and lipogenesis, and some of that work implicated beta-3 adrenergic receptor pathways. A receptor that binds the fragment directly has not been identified. The cartilage studies used animal joint injury models and measured markers of cartilage matrix, and no mechanism for those observations has been established. Overall, the mechanistic literature is small and comes from a limited number of groups.
Molecular Information
- Type: Modified hGH fragment (176-191)
- Length: 16 amino acids
- Molecular weight: 1815.1 g/mol
- Molecular formula: C78H123N23O23S2