Studies on the Cholesterol Content of Normal Human Plasma. Part I

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Abstract
The authors'' conclusions concerning the cholesterol content of normal human plasma are at variance with those of Richter-Quittner and of Bloor and Knudson. The former concluded that blood corpuscles contain exclusively free cholesterol and no ester, whereas the plasma contains only cholesterol esters. The authors find both forms in normal human plasma. Bloor and Knudson''s constant relationship between free and ester cholesterol is not supported. The present work gives the ratios: for men, from 1 (free): 0.82 (ester) to 1 : 3.29; for women, from 1 : 0.97 to 1 : 3.97. Figures are presented showing the amounts of free and ester cholesterol, which are precipitated and combined in some physical or chemical union with the different proteins of human plasma when they are fractionated. Two such experiments, one with pathological and one with normal plasma, indicate that all the cholesterol may be precipitated with the proteins and that most of it accompanies the euglobulin fraction.