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. Author manuscript; available in PMC: 2012 Sep 1.
Published in final edited form as: Obstet Gynecol Clin North Am. 2011 Sep;38(3):467–475. doi: 10.1016/j.ogc.2011.06.001

Figure 5.

Figure 5

Mechanism of steroid-steroid receptor interaction shown for testosterone and androsenediol. Both structures, as C-19 steroids, can compete for the androgen receptor (A.). While androstenediol has a lower binding affinity than that of testosterone, it can bind to the receptor if its concentrations are high enough. In mid-aged women androstenediol is found in concentrations that are many fold higher than testosterone at which, it can bind to the ligand binding domain (LBD) (B.). Regardless of which structure binds, the steroid-receptor complex then uncouples from the heat shock protein (HSP) to form a monimer with the ligand binding domain (LBD) exposed (C.). Two of these monimers combine to form the dimer (D.), that can then dock at the DNA androgen binding element (ARE) to initiate gene expression if the correct cofactors are also present. A similar process is true for the estrogen receptors.