The Pill

The Pill

Norethindrone, the first oral contraceptive has been synthesized and introduced into society during the Sexual Revolution during the 1960s, the rise of Feminism, and the women’s liberal movement. An increasing amount of people were willing to exercise family planning and have access to birth control devices if continuing to have children was not desired. Early attempts for oral contraception included ingesting mercury fried with oil, spitting in the mouth of a frog, eating the burned testicles of a castrated mule, and eating the kidney of uterus of a mule, yet these methods were too bizarre and ineffective to prevent the development of the zygote; a birth control pill had to be synthesized. A steroid is a substance that is lipid-soluble, could have spermicidal properties, and are used to produce performance-enhancing drugs. There are three types of sex hormones, androgens (males), estrogens (females), and progestins (pregnancy). A variety of steroid hormones display different functions and have different physiological activity in the body; for example, the steroid hormone, testosterone, is an anabolic steroid, which means that it promotes muscle growth and development. At stores that sell supplements and performance-enhancing drugs, certain anabolic steroids mimic the effects of testosterone. Cholesterol is a steroid that acts as a precursor to other steroids, which means that it could be metabolized into a steroid hormone such as cortisol or testosterone. The first sex hormone that was isolated has been androsterone from bull testes in 1935, which is a less potent form and a metabolite of testosterone that is excreted in the urine; androsterone is the oxidized from of testosterone; on the pentagon-shaped steroid ring structure, an attached hydroxyl group transforms into a carbonyl group. Whenever a molecule binds to a lower amount of hydrogen ions and established more bonds with oxygen atoms; the molecule exists in its oxidized form. Oxidation decreases the potential of the molecule, yet reducing energy is collected as protons and electrons to aid in aerobic respiration. In 1929, the first female sex hormone that has been isolated has been estradiol from pig ovaries. In the body, estradiol is oxidized into estrone whenever excess amounts of the hormone are present in the bloodstream and are removed through renal excretion. The male sex hormone, testosterone, and the female sex hormone, estradiol, have structural similarities yet small chemical and molecular differences account for great differences in the functions and outcomes of the activity of the hormone in the body; the six-carbon structure on the left in the testosterone molecule contains an attached carbonyl group, along with one double-bond being present in the ring structure. The molecule, estradiol, contains three double-bonds in the ring structure and have an attached hydroxyl group. The hormone, testosterone, has been prescribed to stimulate muscle growth, yet if these supplements that mimic the effects of testosterone are abused, testicular atrophy could occurs because a substance ingested into the body poses the same physiological activity as the testes, which would lower the activity of the testes. At the ring structure, compared to the molecular structure of testosterone, the hydroxyl group is replaced with a carbon atom attached to a carbonyl group and a methyl group. Progesterone is a vital molecule that has influenced society and various social movements because it suppresses ovulation, which means that it could be applied to produce birth control pills; progesterone also signals the preparation of a lining in the uterus for the implantation of a fertilized egg. Russell marker, a chemist who attempted to synthesize a birth control pill, had a low amount of opportunities for a career in chemical research without a doctoral degree, left the university and became interested in steroids; Marker began to study the molecular structures of various steroids and discovered that the roots of the sarsaparilla vine contained a vary abundant source of steroids and contain molecules called sarpons. One of the sarpons, sarsasaponin, contains three glucose molecules attached to a steroid molecule. The enzyme or acid catalyzed decomposition reaction of sarsasaponin into glucose, rhamnose, and sarsasapogenin has occurred. Sarsasapogenin, the derived molecule from one of the saponins in the sarsaparilla vine, has been identical to the molecular structure of progesterone, therefore this process yields to a source of synthetic progesterone. Russell Marker has been reluctant to patent his discovery because he thought that this discovery and his thoughts should be available to everyone. However, other steroids have been synthesized by other scientists. The Marker degradation involved the removal of an unnecessary side group that would yield to the steroid molecule. In 1949, a young Austrian immigrant, Carl Djerassi joined the research facility in Mexico City after graduating from the University of Wisconsin with a Ph.D. used the marker degradation how cortisol could be synthesized from the plant source that Marker used to synthesize progesterone. Progesterone, through microbial oxidation and additional seven chemical reactions has been metabolized in the steroid hormone, cortisol. Cortisol is a glucocorticoid hormone that is secreted by the adrenal cortex in response to long-term stress to reduce inflammation and increase blood-glucose levels through lipid and protein catabolism. In order to stimulate secretion in an endocrine gland, a tropic hormone such as adrenocorticotropin has to be secreted by the anterior pituitary gland. The endocrine hormones do not initiate biochemical processes themselves but control the rate at which they proceed, including the tropic hormones, neurohormones and signals relayed by the hypothalamus, and the hormones secreted by the various endocrine glands. Cortisol and cortisone are both glucocorticoids with similar structures and functions.  After the synthesis of cortisone from progestin, Djerassi synthesizes estrone and estradiol from progesterone obtained and derived from the plant source. Various prohibitions of prescribing, selling, and using birth control methods were prohibited by law during a certain period of time and during the early twentieth century, yet both of the contraceptives, norethindrone and norethynodrel, have been patented and used by many people. The only difference between these two molecules is the position of the double-bond. The birth control pill, norethindrone, which is a synthetic progestin, only works as a contraceptive in women, which means a birth control method should also be researched that would apply to men. The toxic polyphenol, gossypol, suppresses sperm production. Therefore, the synthesis of various steroid hormones and contraceptives have supported the Feminist movement, has aroused awareness that women should have more rights to make decisions concerning family values, to deal with domestic violence more effectively, to occupy different roles in society that were dominated by men in the past, and has effected social change significantly. The author’s argument makes sense because the effects of the birth control pills on society have been immense due to the upbringing of moral values, the upbringing of the opportunity for women to make moral decisions and judgments concerning family values, and the support these discoveries imposed on social movements demanding more rights and awareness towards women.