Professor of Physiology Emeritus
Dr. Sokol received her B.A. from Hunter College (City University of New York) in 1950 and her Ph.D. in biology from Harvard University in 1957. She taught at Boston University, Wellesley College, and Tufts University and was a Research Associate in Physiology at Harvard Medical School before coming to Dartmouth in 1961. She was appointed to a faculty position in the Department of Physiology in 1963.
Dr. Sokol's research interests were in the field of neuroendocrinology. Her predoctoral studies were focussed on fish endocrinology and neurosecretion. Her arrival at Dartmouth coincided with the discovery of the Brattleboro rat. In collaboration with Dr. Heinz Valtin a valuable animal model with a hereditary defect in the synthesis of the hypothalamic antidiuretic hormone, vasopressin, was developed. Before antibodies were available for the immunocytochemical localization of hormones the Brattleboro rat provided significant information about the biosynthesis of the neurohypophysial hormones, vasopressin and oxytocin; e.g. that they were made in different neurons in both the supraoptic and paraventricular nuclei of the hypothalamus and that each hormone was associated with a distinct neurophysin. With the new immunocytochemical tools now available extensive neural pathways can be delineated indicative of additional roles for these hormones as neurotransmitters and/or neuromodulators.
Sokol, H.W., and Valtin, H. eds. The Brattleboro Rat. Ann. N.Y. Acad. Sci. Vol. 394, 1982.
Sokol, H.W., and Zimmerman, E.A. The hormonal status of the Brattleboro rat. Ann. N.Y. Acad. Sci. 394:535-548, 1982.
Elfont, R.M., and Sokol, H.W. Salt and water intake in Brattleboro rats with hypothalamic diabetes insipidus. Physiol. Behav. 39:53-61, 1987.
Morris, J.F., Pow, D.V., Sokol, H.W., and Ward, A. Dendritic release of peptides from magnocellular neurons in normal rats, Brattleboro rats, and mice with hereditary nephrogenic diabetes insipidus. In Vasopressin, P. Gross, D. Richter, G.L. Robertson, eds. John Libbey Eurotext, pp. 171-182, 1993.