A diet containing myristoleic plus palmitoleic acids elevates plasma cholesterol in young growing swine

The objective of this study was to test the effect of a novel fatty acid mixture, enriched with myristoleic and palmitoleic acids, on plasma lipoprotein cholesterol concentrations. Weanling pigs were assigned to one of six groups and each group received a diet differing in fatty acid composition. Diets were fed for 35 days and contained 10 g added cornstarch/100 g (to provide baseline data) or 10 g added fatty acids/100 g. For those diets containing added fatty acids, extracted lipids contained 36% myristoleic plus palmitoleic acid combined (14:1/16:1 diet), 52% palmitic acid (16:0 diet), 51% stearic acid (18:0 diet), 47% oleic acid (18:1 diet), or 38% linoleic acid (18:2 diet). With the exception of the cornstarch diet, all diets contained approximately 30% myristic acid. There were no significant differences in weight gain across treatment groups (P = 0.22). All diets caused a significant increase in triglycerides and in total, low density lipoprotein, high density lipoprotein, and very low density lipoprotein cholesterol. The increase in total plasma cholesterol from pretreatment values was greatest in pigs fed the 14:1/16:1 and 18:1 diets. However, the increase in low density lipoprotein cholesterol from the pretreatment concentration was greatest in the 14:1/16:1-fed pigs. Increases in very low density lipoprotein cholesterol above pretreatment concentrations were lowest in 16:0-fed pigs and greatest in 18:1-fed pigs. Dietary fatty acids elicited changes in plasma fatty acids which generally were reflective of the diets, although the 18:0 diet did not alter plasma fatty acid concentrations and the 16:0 diet increased plasma 16:0 only at the end of the study. These results demonstrated that the combination of myristoleic plus palmitoleic acids increased plasma cholesterol in young pigs, suggesting that fatty acid chain length, rather than degree of unsaturation, is primarily responsible for the effects of fatty acids on circulating lipoprotein cholesterol concentrations.