RESUMO
This study was designed to test bitter and sweet lupin seeds as lipid-lowering and their antioxidative activities on hypercholesterolemic rats. The levels of plasma lipid, malondialdehyde [MDA] and whole blood reduced glutathione [GSH], as well as the activities of transaminases [ALT and AST], lactate dehydrogenase [LDH] in plasma, superoxide dismutase [SOD], glutathione peroxidase [GPx] in erythrocytes and plasma glutathione reductase [OR], glutathione-S-transferase [OST] and catalase [CAT] were examined. The hypercholesterolemia-induced diet was manifested in the elevation of total lipids [TL], total cholesterol [TC], triglycerides [TO], LDL-C and MDA levels, ALT, AST, LDH activities and depletion of OSH and enzymic antioxidants. Supplementation of hypercholesterolemia-indUced diet with bitter and sweet lupin seeds significantly lowered the plasma levels of TL, TC, TG and LDL-C. ALT, AST and LDH activities slightly decreased in treated groups compared with hypercholesterolemic group [HC]. Furthermore, the content of GSH significantly increased while MDA significantly decreased in treated groups compared with HC group. In addition, bitter lupin seeds group improved enzymic antioxidants compared with HC group. In general, the results indicated that, the bitter lupin seeds supplements are better than sweet lupin seeds. These results suggested that the hypocholesterolemic effect of bitter and sweet lupin seeds supplements might be due to their abilities to lower plasma cholesterol level as well as to slow down the lipid peroxidation process and to enhance the antioxidant enzyme activity