Authors
Muriana FJ. Villar J. Ruiz-Gutierrez V.
Institution
Instituto de la Grasa, CSIC, Seville, Spain. muriana@cica.es
Title
Intake of olive oil can
modulate the transbilayer movement of human erythrocyte membrane cholesterol.
Source
Cellular & Molecular Life Sciences. 53(6):496-500, 1997 Jun.
Abstract
Transbilayer movement of erythrocyte membrane cholesterol is impaired in
patients affected with essential hypertension. This is an inherited disorder,
but environmental factors are also involved. Dietary fats might play a role
in the prevention and/or treatment of such abnormality in the kinetic pools
of membrane cholesterol. We tested this hypothesis by using a diet (in which
30% of the energy came from fat) rich in olive
oil or in high-oleic sunflower oil (as
natural sources of monounsaturated fatty acids, MUFAs) and determining their
influence on the movement of cholesterol into the lipid bilayer of the
erythrocyte membrane after a four-week period. We concluded that dietary
olive oil is helpful in normalizing the
impaired transbilayer movement of membrane cholesterol in erythrocytes of
eight normocholesterolaemic and eight hypercholesterolaemic hypertensive
patients. However, the effects cannot be attributed exclusively to the
content of MUFAs (mainly oleic acid) in the diet, as high-oleic sunflower
oil was unable to induce favourable changes.