RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN DIET AND COMPOSITION OF BLADDER BILE IN MICE

Three groups of young white mice (strain NMRI) were reared on artificial diets without added fat, consisting of casein 20%, carbohydrate 74.3%, salt mixture 5%, vitamin mixture 0.5%, and choline chloride 0.2%. Group 1 received the carbohydrate entirely in the form of glucose, group 2 received the carbohydrate in the form of 62.3% glucose + 12% rice starch, whereas group 3 received the carbohydrate entirely in the form of rice starch. After having received the diets for 42-45 days the mice were killed and their bladder bile analyzed quantitatively with respect to cholesterol, lipid-soluble phosphorus and taurine-conjugated bile acids. The object being to determine whether in mice the diet in which all the carbohydrate is rice starch produces higher ratios between bile acids and cholesterol and between lipid-soluble phosphorus and cholesterol than do the two other diets. No evidence for such an effect of the rice starch diet was found. The average values of the above-mentioned ratios were even slightly lower for the animals in group 3 than for the animals in groups 1 and 2. Therefore, the previously found markedly different effect of the two carbohydrates, rice starch and glucose, on the composition of bladder bile of hamsters does not represent a general principle applying to all species of rodents. © 1969 Dr. Dietrich Steinkopff Verlag.