Table 1.

Comparison of lipid and lipoprotein metabolism features

	Human	Rabbit	Mouse
Major plasma lipoproteins	LDL	LDL	HDL
CETP	Abundant	Abundant	None
Hepatic apoB mRNA editing	No	No	Yes
apoB-48	Chylomicrons	Chylomicrons	VLDLs/LDLs and Chylomicrons
apoB-100	Can be bound to apo(a)	Can be bound to apo(a)	Cannot be bound to apo(a)
HDL	Heterogeneous	Heterogeneous	Homogeneous
apoAII	Dimer	Absent	Monomer
Hepatic LDL receptor activity	Down-regulated	Down-regulated	Usually high
VLDL receptor in macrophages	Yes	Yes	No
Hepatic lipase	High, liver-bound	Low, liver-bound	High, 70% in circulation
Cholesterol pool	Mainly from hepatic synthesis	Mainly from hepatic synthesis	Mainly from dietary origin
Excretion of bile acid	Low	Low	High
Response to a cholesterol diet	Sensitive	Sensitive	Resistant