The effect of dietary carbohydrate and fat on the activities of some enzymes responsible for glycerolipid synthesis in rat liver.

1. Male rats were fed for 14 days on diets containing (by wt.) 53% of starch, or on diets in which 20% of the starch was replaced by sucrose, corn oil or lard. 2. The hepatic activities of the microsomal glycerol phosphate acyltransferase, dihydroxyacetone phosphate acyltransferase, phosphatidate cytidylyltransferase, diacylglycerol acyltransferase and choline phosphotransferase, and of the soluble phosphatidate phosphohydrolase, were measured. 3. The soluble phosphatidate phosphohydrolase activity was higher in those rats fed on lard than in those fed on the starch diet. Choline phosphotransferase activity was higher in the rats fed on corn oil than in those fed on the starch diet. 4. The rate of hepatic glycerolipid synthesis was measured in vivo 1 min after injection of [1,3-3H]glycerol and [1-14C]palmitate into the portal veins. 5. The relative rate of phosphatidylcholine synthesis in vivo was increased after feeding with corn oil and the higher specific activity of choline phosphotransferase may contribute to this result. The equivalent rate of triacylglycerol synthesis was increased by feeding with lard rather than corn oil, and the increased activity of phosphatidate phosphohydrolase may partly explain this. The latter changes probably contribute to the increased concentration of triacylglycerol which other authors have observed in the livers and sera of animals fed on saturated and monounsaturated fats.