METABOLISM OF LIPIDS AND LIPOPROTEINS. THE VASCULAR WALL IN RATS WITH SPONTANEOUS HIGH AND LOW RESPONSE TO CHOLESTEROL DIET

Publisher Summary This chapter discusses a study to investigate the metabolism of lipids and lipoproteins. Wistar rats were divided into high response and low response animals according to their cholesterolemia before and after 28 days of cholesterol diet consumption. Males and females were allowed to mate within their respective group. The rats were then kept for 28 days on cholesterol diet (CHD). The dietary regimen did not cause any significant reduction in body weight or produce disease symptoms, which could be detected by inspection. At the end of the 28-day CHD consumption, the female animals were sacrificed by decapitation after overnight fasting and blood was collected into tubes with EDTA and the plasma isolated from the rats of each group was pooled before the separation of lipoproteins. It was observed that the distribution of cholesterol concentration in the blood of rats on a standard laboratory diet is very similar to that reported by Mimura in man. Some animals had a very low or very high concentration of cholesterol in plasma; however, in the majority of the tested animals, cholesterolemia was in the middle between these two extreme concentrations.