Abstract
This experiment was undertaken to investigate the hypocholesterolemic effect of prepared soy milk (PSM).
Experiment 1: In order to study the effect of three different oils (soybean, corn, sunflower oil) and soybean-phospholipids (soybean-lecithin: LEC) on serum cholesterol (CHOL), rats were fed a hypercholesterolemic diets for two weeks. The values of serum CHOL in rats fed sunflower oil, corn oil and soybean oil were 166mg/dl, 175mg/dl and 227mg/dl respectively. These values were lower than that (275mg/dl) in rats fed casein-lard diet. The values of serum CHOL in rats fed 0% soybean-LEC (corn oil group), 0.3% soybean-LEC and 3% soybean-LEC diets were 175mg/dl, 186mg/dl and 160mg/dl respectively.
Experiment 2: In order to examine the CHOL-lowering effect of PSM and milk on hypothyroid hypercholesterolemia induced by 2-thiouracil (TU), rats were fed a diet with or without 0.3% TU for three weeks. The values of serum CHOL in rats fed PSM, PSM-TU, milk or milk-TU were 67mg/dl, 119mg/dl, 70mg/dl and 128mg/dl respectively.
These results suggest that prepared soy milk is capable of alleviating exogenous hypercholesterolemia, but not of improving endogenous hypercholesterolemia.
