Choline and the dietary production of fatty livers

Choline as a Dietary Factor

“…The choline of lecithin, of sphingomyelin, or of other choline-containing compounds is there fore not available (93,94,95,96,97). There is no evidence that there is a decrease in the total phospholipid content of the liver when ani mals are maintained on a ration rich : in fat and relatively poor in choline or that the provision of choline causes a significant increase (27,36). The phospholipid is, of course, greatly diluted by the large amount of neutral fat which accumulates when the diet is deficient in lipotropic factors and this might conceivably produce an upset in physicochemical relationships.…”

“…In later experiments the liver fat was fractionated (27) and definite evidence was obtained that choline inhil:iited the deposition of cho lesterol esters as well as glyceride. This :finding was .confirmed and it was noted that the effect on the glyceride was more marked than on the cholesterol esters (36).…”

“…The hypothesis that choline chloride is phosphorylated and utilized in the synthesis of lecithin is supported by the fact that the phosphoric acid ester of choline chloride is unaffected by liver phosphatase and therefore pro tected from hydrolysis in the liver. The possibility that phospholipid is formed and transported to other tissues or utilized, in part, in the liver itself is now therefore an attractive one (27,36,47,98,99).…”

“…The effect of choline on the glyceride fraction of ((fat" and" cho lesterol" fatty livers.-In the first experiments in which liver fat was fractionated (27) , it was shown that the extensive deposition of neu tral fat which resulted from feeding diets high in fat or cholesterol was inhibited by choline. This was confirmed by Aylward, Chan non & Wilkinson (28) who noted an effect of choline on the glyceride frac tion after a single meal rich in fat.…”

The Choline-Containing Phospholipids of Serum 1

“…In view of the well-established role of choline as a lipotropic factor (1)(2)(3)(4)(5), it seemed of interest to determine whether a relative or absolute deficiency of lipotropic substances was a factor contributing to human liver disease. If this were the case it might be interpreted as an abnormality in the choline-containing fraction of the serum phospholipids.…”