Abstract
Squirrel and cebus monkeys fed a coconut oil diet develop comparable hypercholesterolemias, but the squirrel monkey primarily expands its low-density lipoprotein cholesterol pool, whereas the cebus primarily increases its HDL pool of cholesterol. These results, coupled with the greater accumulation of aortic lipid, particularly cholesteryl ester, in the atherosclerotic-susceptible squirrel monkey, support the concept of the protective nature of high-density lipoproteins and the athero-genic potential of LDL. They also suggest that a species' genetic control of the lipoprotein response to diet is variable and has important biological implications.
This work was supported in part by National Institutes of Health Research Grants HL-10098 and HL-70285 and the Fund for Research and Teaching, Department of Nutrition, Harvard School of Public Health.