{"id":16953,"date":"2021-02-19T10:00:22","date_gmt":"2021-02-19T15:00:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.vrg.org\/blog\/?p=16953"},"modified":"2021-02-09T15:06:15","modified_gmt":"2021-02-09T20:06:15","slug":"cholesterol-in-plants","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.vrg.org\/blog\/2021\/02\/19\/cholesterol-in-plants\/","title":{"rendered":"Cholesterol in Plants?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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By Reed Mangels, PhD, RD<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Although we usually think of\ncholesterol as coming from animal products, plants contain very small amounts\nof cholesterol.1<\/sup> The cholesterol content of plants is estimated to\nbe hundreds to thousands times less than that of animals.2<\/sup> These low\nlevels of cholesterol mean that plants\u2019 contribution to dietary cholesterol\nintake is extremely small. We were only able to find estimates of cholesterol\namounts in plant oils but not in whole plant foods. Corn oil, for example, is\nreported to have 55 milligrams of cholesterol in a kilogram of oil.1<\/sup>\nThis works out to less than 1 milligram of cholesterol in a tablespoon of corn\noil.  In contrast, one egg yolk has 184\nmilligrams of cholesterol.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

     Plants contain much higher amounts of\nsubstances similar to cholesterol but with a slightly different structure\ncalled phytosterols or plant sterols. Manufacturers use plant sterols to make\ncholesterol which is sometimes used in pharmaceuticals.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

     Vegans and lacto-ovo vegetarians have\nhigher mean intakes of phytosterols than do nonvegetarians.3<\/sup> This\nmay be a benefit of a plant-based diet since higher consumption of plant\nsterols is associated with lower blood cholesterol and LDL (bad) cholesterol\nlevels.4,5<\/sup><\/p>\n\n\n\n

References<\/p>\n\n\n\n

1. Behrman EJ, Gopalan V.\nCholesterol and plants. J Chem Educ.<\/em>\n2005; 82:1791\u20131793.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

2. Sonawane PD, Pollier J,\nPanda S, et al. Plant cholesterol biosynthetic pathway overlaps with\nphytosterol metabolism. Nat Plants<\/em>. 2016;3:16205. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

3. Jaceldo-Siegl K, L\u00fctjohann\nD, Sirirat R, Mashchak A, Fraser GE, Haddad E. Variations in dietary intake and\nplasma concentrations of plant sterols across plant-based diets among North\nAmerican adults. Mol Nutr Food Res<\/em>. 2017;61(8):10.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

4. Andersson SW, Skinner J,\nElleg\u00e5rd L, et al. Intake of dietary plant sterols is inversely related to\nserum cholesterol concentration in men and women in the EPIC Norfolk\npopulation: a cross-sectional study. Eur\nJ Clin Nutr<\/em>. 2004;58(10):1378-85.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

5. Klingberg S, Elleg\u00e5rd L,\nJohansson I, et al. Inverse relation between dietary intake of naturally\noccurring plant sterols and serum cholesterol in northern Sweden. Am J Clin Nutr<\/em>. 2008;87(4):993-1001.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For more nutrition\ninformation, see https:\/\/www.vrg.org\/nutrition\/<\/a>\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The contents of this posting,\nour website, and our other publications, including Vegetarian Journal, are not\nintended to provide personal medical advice. Medical advice should be obtained\nfrom a qualified health professional. We often depend on product and ingredient\ninformation from company statements. It is impossible to be 100% sure about a\nstatement, info can change, people have different views, and mistakes can be\nmade. Please use your best judgment about whether a product is suitable for\nyou. To be sure, do further research or confirmation on your own.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Reed Mangels, PhD, RD Although we usually think of cholesterol as coming from animal products, plants contain very small amounts of cholesterol.1 The cholesterol content of plants is estimated to be hundreds to thousands times less than that of animals.2 These low levels of cholesterol mean that plants\u2019 contribution to dietary cholesterol intake is […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-16953","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vrg.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16953","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vrg.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vrg.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vrg.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vrg.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16953"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.vrg.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16953\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":16955,"href":"https:\/\/www.vrg.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16953\/revisions\/16955"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.vrg.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16953"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vrg.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16953"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.vrg.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16953"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}