Mechanism of hypercholesterolemia in arteriolipidosis-prone rats (ALR)

The cholesterol metabolism of a newly established model for atherogenesis, named arteriolipidosis-prone rats (ALR), selected from spontaneously hypertensive rats (SHR), was investigated in comparison with a substrain of SHR (B) (nonarteriolipidosis-prone rats) and the normotensive control. Wistar-Kyoto (WK) rats. Serum cholesterol of ALR was significantly lower than that of WK. Uptake of labelled serum cholesterol by the isolated liver cells at 37 degrees C was higher in ALR than in WK. The data for SHR (B) fell in between these two. On the other hand, on feeding a cholesterol diet, serum cholesterol increased in the order WK, SHR (B) and ALR, with the highest being ALR. The absorption of cholesterol in ALR was about twice as great as in WK and SHR (B).