Fecal glucocorticoids document stress in female Barbary macaques (Macaca sylvanus)

Patterns of received aggression and the endocrine response were related to an increase in fecal glucocorticoid metabolites in an intact semifree-rangi ng group of Barbary macaque females in order to quantify the social stress incurred over a 20-week observation period. The novel result showed that im munoreactive cortisol and 11-oxoetiocholanolone found in the feces can inde ed determine the endocrine response of the adrenal gland after a social str essor. After HPLC separation of pooled fecal samples, EIA analyses using th ree different assays (corticosterone, cortisol, and 11-oxoetiocholanolone) to quantify immunoreactive steroids showed that the corticosterone EIA had no distinctive immunoreactive peaks. Cortisol and 11-oxoetiocholanolone imm unoassays showed respectively four and two immunoreactive substances. Time series analyses revealed a behaviorally initiated increase in concentration s of cortisol and 11-oxoetiocholanolone equivalents. Furthermore, both horm one curves exhibit comparable time functions. Either antibody is very suita ble for determining glucocorticoid secretion after periods of stress. (C) 1 999 Academic Press.