Exercise Enhances Whole-Body Cholesterol Turnover in Mice.

The article provides information on the investigation whether the voluntary wheel running in mice modulates cholesterol and bile acid metabolism. It states that the male mice were randomly assigned to have accessed to a voluntary running wheel for 2 wk (RUN group) or remained sedentary (SED group). It shows that the RUN group ran an average of 10 km.d-1 and displayed lower plasma cholesterol compared with SED (P=0.030). It concludes that the voluntary wheel running increased cholesterol turnover in healthy mice owing to an increased fecal bile acid excretion and a decreased intestinal cholesterol absorption. It emphasizes that enhanced cholesterol turnover may contribute to the established reduction of cardiovascular risk induced by regular exercise.