Cholesterol: Do chylomicrons clog your arteries? (2)

I'll keep this brief.

The comments on the last post are awash with people trying to help my resident lipophobe out of his lipophobia. This is admirable but misguided and ultimately doomed.

Many years ago I looked at the Copenhagen Heart Study. This observational study generated two hypotheses. One is that chylomicrons kill you. That seems enough for a lipophobe and, if you have this mindset, for goodness sake add carbs to your diet and avoid post prandial hyperlipidaemia. The choice is yours. Go for it. The lack of stress will help you no end.

My own hypothesis is that elevated post prandial triglycerides, here in a population on a mixed diet, is a surrogate for insulin resistance. That is rather similar to an elevated HbA1c under the same circumstances. These are both superficial markers for a failure of complex I of the electron transport chain to effectively deal with the amount of NADH being provided by processing of the diet.

The solution from a Hyperlipid point of view is to concentrate on supplying FADH2 to the ETC via beta oxidation of maximally saturated fatty acids and to minimise NADH input via chronic normoglycaemia, possibly assisted by the inhibition of glycolysis by ketones.

I have no interest in converting lipophobes to lipophiles. We all have our problems, we just have to live with them.

But some gems are coming out of chylomicrons and endotoxin reading. I especially enjoyed this one (among many), all quotes from the same paper:

"Therefore, on the basis of current information, lipoproteins modulate the host response to endotoxin by inhibiting the activation of macrophages, monocytes, and other LPS-responsive cells; promoting the catabolism of LPS by the hepatic parenchymal cells; and inhibiting the response of hepatocytes to pro inflammatory stimuli"

"Early in the course of this work, we found that chylomicron increases the clearance of LPS by the liver while decreasing overall TNF-α production"

"These most recent studies are focused on cells that express the low-density lipoprotein receptor and are critical to the innate immune response to infection, including adrenocortical cells and vascular endothelial cells. The postulated series of events, whereby a foreign molecule (i.e., LPS) serves to both trigger and attenuate a programmed cellular stress response, is unprecedented"

My emphasis.

Now, a functional LDL-C receptor is utterly necessary for the anti-inflammatory effect of the chylomicron/endotoxin complex. If someone's ears don't prick up on this one they have clearly never heard of homozygous familial hypecholesterolaemia. The focus on elevated lipids (sigh) might just have missed the core of the problem, which is the failure to internalise lipoproteins. Interesting idea? It certainly is to me.

Peter