422 V. BLOOD LIPIDS 



Following hypophysectomy, the blood cholesterol rose to a new level, which 

 was the same in both the "high" and the "low" genetic types. 



Strangely enough, the results on mice are diametrically opposed to those 

 for rats. It was proved by MacLachlan 401 that a statistically significant 

 rise in total blood lipids and acetone-soluble lipids occurred when three- 

 month old male albino mice were fasted. Blood phospholipid was appar- 

 ently related to the prefasting level. No change in the unsaturation of the 

 several fat fractions was noted during fasting, which would indicate that 

 no preferential or selective utilization of storage fats occurred. In a later 

 study 402 it was found that lipemia occurred in the early part of the period, 

 followed by a drop in concentration on the fifth day of fasting. 



In the rabbit, the blood cholesterol is elevated on fasting. 403 - 404 Shope 403 

 reported earlier that hypocholesterolemia accompanies fasting in the cat, 

 guinea pig, swine, and man. Mann and White 405 found that the hypo- 

 cholesterolemia observed in dogs subjected to inanition resulted in a dis- 

 proportionate reduction of the esterified fraction. This plasma change 

 was found to be associated with parallel alterations in the size and chole- 

 sterol content of the adrenal glands. It is possible to produce a similar 

 plasma cholesterol change in normal dogs with ACTH, but not with corti- 

 sone. 



It is generally believed that man, in contradistinction to other species, 

 usually develops a hyperlipemia during inanition. Fahrig and Wacker 300 

 found that all components of the blood lipids of men were increased during 

 fasting. These findings were confirmed in the extensive experiments of 

 Kartin et a/. 398 on man. It was found that, after two days of complete 

 fasting, the cholesterol and lipid phosphorus had increased perceptibly in 

 only a few of their subjects. When the fast was continued for six days, 

 both of these fractions increased in all cases. The changes were roughly 

 parallel to those of the ketone bodies, which had appeared in appreciable 

 amounts in the blood in all cases after this interval. 



Petersen 405 * 1 noted that the increase in serum phospholipids which oc- 

 curred during fasting in human subjects was confined to the sphingomyelin 

 fraction, while no changes were observed in the level of serum lecithins or 

 cephalins. It was found that the level of serum sphingomyelin was re- 



401 P. L. MacLachlan, /. Biol. Chem., 152, 391-394 (1944). 



402 H. C. Hodge, P. L. MacLachlan, W. R. Bloor, E. A. Welch, S. L. Romberg, and 

 M. Falkenheim, /. Biol. Chem., 169, 707-711 (1947). 



403 R. E. Shope, /. Biol. Chem., 75, 101-113 (1927). 



404 G. W. Ellis and J. A. Gardner, Proc. Roy. Soc. London, B85, 385-393 (1912). 

 m C. V. Mann and H. S. White, Metabolism, 2, 47-58 (1953). 



405a v. P. Petersen, Acta Med. Scand., US, 249-259 (1952). 



