Three groups of weanling male rats were fed for five weeks on diets, which were added about 25 mg/100g of roughly equal mixture of α-, β-, γ; - and δ-tocopherol and lard, beef tallow or safflower oil as dietary fat (LA-25, BT-25, or 50-25, respectively). After feeding, the effect of dietary fat on tissue uptake and the accumulation of each of tocopherols were investigated by analyzing tocopherols in various tissues of those rats, using high performance liquid chromatography.
1) During feeding, the body weight of rat in the group BT-25 fed on the lowest content of linoleic acid was significantly lower than those in other two groups. However, no significant differences were found among three grougs in the relative organ weight for both liver and lung after feeding.
2) Comparisons of groups LA-25 and BT-25 showed that the concentration of each tocopherol in any tissue hardly changed by a deficiency of essential fatty acids.
3) Comparisons of groups LA-25 and SO-25 showed a tendency that the concentration of α-tocopherol in any tissue decreased with an increase in the content of linoleic acid in the diet, while the concentration of β-tocopherol rather slightly increased. Thus, in terms of the composition of tocopherols, the percentage of α-tocopherol decreased while that of β-tocopherol increased.
