Carole Hooven, Ph.D.

Okay.

So this is interesting.

And I don't know the paper.

What I will say, first of all, is that as far as estrogen in males, in rodents, for example, talking about masculinization in very early development,

Masculinization in rodents clearly occurs via conversion of testosterone once that gets into the brain via aromatase.

So if you block aromatase, you get essentially a female rodent brain.

the testosterone gets into the brain.

Estrogen is actually prevented.

The peripheral testosterone is prevented by a protein called alpha-fetoprotein in rodents.

So maternal estrogen is bound so that females are not masculinized.

The testicular produced testosterone from the male testicles is high.

That gets into the brain.

That gets aromatized.

Once it passes the blood, yes, gets in there.

That's right.

That's a pretty elegant solution.

It is an elegant solution.

So it is clear that it's estrogen acting via estrogen receptors that are masculinizing sexual and aggressive behavior, which is just very clear in rodents because you have lordosis in females and mounting in males and you have higher rates of male aggression, etc.

This does not happen in humans.

I know that there's misunderstanding about that.