• Home
• Background
• Publications
• Resources
• Symposia
• Join
• Members
  • Dr Alison Avenell
  • Dr Alex Johnstone
  • Dr Arthur Stewart
  • Dr Clare Adam
  • Dr Dave Hazlerigg
  • Dr Diane Jackson (co-chairperson 2009)
  • Dr Gerald Lobley
  • Dr Geraldine McNeill
  • Dr Julian Mercer
  • Dr Lynda Williams
  • Dr Nigel Hoggard
  • Dr Perry Barrett
  • Dr Sandy Ross (co-chairperson 2009)
  • Professor John Iain Broom
  • Professor John Speakman
  • Professor Kevin Docherty
  • Professor Peter Morgan
  • Dr Janice Drew
  • Dr Mody Nimesh
  • Dr Mirela Delibegovic
• News
• Funding

Dr Clare Adam

Research Interests

Incidence of obesity is reaching global epidemic proportions yet its multi-factorial aetiology has yet to be fully elucidated. Regulatory pathways in the brain (hypothalamus) normally control appetite and body weight in response to blood-borne factors (notably leptin) that signal nutritional status from the periphery, but this feedback mechanism is defective in obesity. Obese individuals have high blood leptin concentrations and are resistant to its anorexigenic hypothalamic actions.

We are investigating the underlying mechanisms controlling sensitivity to leptin at the levels of blood-brain transport and of leptin receptor and post-receptor signalling within the hypothalamus. For leptin and interacting nutritional signals such as insulin and ghrelin, we measure in vivo blood-brain transfer and hypothalamic responses by the appetite and reproductive neuroendocrine axes, and we determine in vitro the underlying molecular changes in receptor and neuropeptide expression. We are further investigating how the actions of these regulatory pathways depend on an individual's nutritional history during both adult and prenatal life.

Highlighted Publications

Munoz-Gutierrez M, Findlay PA, Adam CL, Wax G, Campbell BK, Kendall NR, Khalid M, Forsberg M, Scaramuzzi RJ. The ovarian expression of mRNAs for aromatase, IGF-I receptor, IGF-binding protein-2, -4 and -5, leptin and leptin receptor in cycling ewes after three days of leptin infusion. Reproduction. 2005 Dec;130(6):869-81.

Archer ZA, Rhind SM, Findlay PA, Kyle CE, Barber MC, Adam CL. Hypothalamic responses to peripheral glucose infusion in food restricted sheep are influenced by photoperiod. J Endocrinol. 2005 Mar;184(3):515-25.

Adam CL, Mercer JG. Appetite regulation and seasonality: implications for obesity. Proc Nutr Soc. 2004 Aug;63(3):413-9. Review.

Archer ZA, Findlay PA, McMillen SR, Rhind SM, Adam CL. Effects of nutritional status and gonadal steroids on expression of appetite-regulatory genes in the hypothalamic arcuate nucleus of sheep. J Endocrinol. 2004 Sep;182(3):409-19.

Muhlhausler BS, McMillen IC, Rouzaud G, Findlay PA, Marrocco EM, Rhind SM,Adam CL. Appetite regulatory neuropeptides are expressed in the sheep hypothalamus before birth. J Neuroendocrinol. 2004 Jun;16(6):502-7.