Wylie Vale Jr., an eminent endocrinologist who helped identify the hormones through which the brain governs basic bodily functions and who was involved in a combative race for the Nobel Prize, died Jan. 3 at his vacation home in Hana, Hawaii. He was 70.

The cause was not yet known, his wife, Mary Elizabeth, said.

Vale spent most of his career at the Salk Institute in San Diego, where he led efforts to identify the group of hormones involved in bodily functions like growth, reproduction and temperature. Their discovery was a landmark in the history of endocrinology, coming after more than 30 years of bitter competition.

The Nobel Prize went to others, but Vale “really, in the long run, had the biggest impact in the field,” said Bert O’Malley, an endocrinologist at the Baylor College of Medicine in Houston.

Vale’s first target was the master hormone known as CRF, or corticotrophin releasing factor, which integrates and controls the body’s response to stress. Vale discovered CRF in 1981 and the next year found a second hormone, called the growth hormone releasing factor, or GRF, which had also eluded the older scientists. GRF controls the body’s growth.

Vale founded two companies to exploit his discoveries. One, Neurocrine Biosciences, is testing drugs that block the action of CRF that may help manage clinical depression. The other, AcceleronPharma, is testing drugs for treating anemia.