The pancreatic beta cells have estrogenRECEPTORS. Estrogenic receptors trigger insulin release which is why they tell women on oral contraceptives to watch out for strokes and heart problems.
The compound may help desire and arousal disorders in postmenopausal women, perhaps by stimulating estrogenreceptors at sites in the body, including the brain, says Michael Diamond, an obstetrician and gynecologist at Wayne State University.
Because the most common types of breast cancer depend on estrogen to grow, experts once feared that soy isoflavones could stimulate the estrogenreceptors in breast-cancer cells, even though the estrogens in soy are much weaker than those produced by the body.