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Longitudinal MRI reveals adolescent pituitary growth patterns linked to puberty and environmental exposures

Year: 2026

Type: preprint

Abstract: Puberty is a period of profound behavioral reorganization that recalibrates social motivation, risk-taking, and sexual behavior in ways that shape lifelong human health. Yet its characterization in population-based studies relies largely on self-report, which reflects perceived physical changes rather than the neuroendocrine substrates driving the transition. The pituitary gland sits at the center of this reorganization, coordinating hypothalamic-pituitary axes that orchestrate puberty. Leveraging 11,818 adolescents (ABCD Study; 30,276 MRI observations), we show that pituitary volume is a precise, scalable marker of pubertal progression carrying non-redundant information beyond chronological age, salivary hormones, and self-reported stage. Sex-specific non-linear trajectories, accelerated expansion anchored to menarche, and distinct patterns across menarche timing subgroups capture both the timing and tempo of puberty at population scale. Pituitary volume was further associated with ACEs and decreased within-person growth following hormonal contraception initiation, positioning it as a sensitive index of the biological embedding of exogenous exposures known to influence pubertal maturation.

Source: medRxiv

DOI: 10.64898/2026.06.26.26356701

Authors: Giorgia Picci, Deanna M. Barch, Bart Larsen, Carina Heller, Damien A. Fair, Bianca T. Leonard, Leah H. Somerville, Michael A. Yassa, Hal S. Stern, Lynsie R. Warr, Elizabeth A. Shirtcliff, Jerod M. Rasmussen

Institutions: Creighton University, Boys Town National Research Hospital, Washington University in St. Louis, University of Minnesota, University of California, Santa Barbara, Jena University Hospital, University of California, Irvine, Harvard University, Boston Children's Hospital

Language: English

Topic: Hypothalamic control of reproductive hormones

Subfield: Reproductive Medicine

Field: Medicine

Domain: Health Sciences

SDG: Good health and well-being

Open Access status: green

Funders: National Alliance for Research on Schizophrenia and Depression, Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft, National Institutes of Health, National Institute of Mental Health, National Institute on Drug Abuse

Awards: G1020259976, G1569016918, G1742849658, G2003922037, G2150354811, G2218553252, G2715786902, G2782475662, G2844825193, G298833120, G3166945029, G3563224455, G3755973507, G378850153, G3992405086, G4066048162, G4142848390, G4680818468, G4902183580, G5061896360, G5081895789, G5139799579, G540810554, G5671520129, G5723270564, G6188346138, G6373421114, G6653174320, G6667901327, G687916792, G6887863799, G6899335511, G6922259526, G6967829241, G7166423909, G7271102572, G7652160222, G771167098, G8132297629, G8281824583, G8381562563, G8486495155, G8606111478, G860757422, G8679417706, G8762821959, G8865478933, G9000006386, G9000008241, G9000034221, G9000042425, G9000046731, G9000061868, G9000108491, G9000112882, G9000113866, G9000163168, G9000202101, G9000205938, G9000241459, G9000286149, 9/21 ABCD-USA CONSORTIUM: RESEARCH PROJECT SITE AT U MICHIGAN, Fetal Programming of Human Newborn Energy Homeostasis Brain Networks, 17/21 ABCD-USA CONSORTIUM: RESEARCH PROJECT SITE AT UCLA, 8/21 ABCD-USA CONSORTIUM: RESEARCH PROJECT SITE AT CHLA, 6/21 ABCD-USA CONSORTIUM: RESEARCH PROJECT SITE AT OHSU, Brain iron as a neurodevelopmental mechanism for transdianostic executive dysfunction, 21/21 ABCD-USA CONSORTIUM: RESEARCH PROJECT SITE AT WUSTL, 2/21 ABCD-USA CONSORTIUM: RESEARCH PROJECT SITE AT UMB, G923039674, G95833762

OpenAlex ID: W7166551908

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