Influence of dietary calcium and cholecalciferol on composition of plasma lipids in young pigs.

Young growing pigs were fed diets containing either 1 or 3 times the daily requirement of calcium and 1, 5 or 25 times the daily requirement of vitamin D (as cholecalciferol) in a completely randomized design with treatments in a 2 X 3 factorial arrangement. Excess dietary calcium increased the phospholipid concentration in the plasma, but not its partitioning among plasma lipoproteins. The level of dietary calcium had no effect on cholesterol, triacylglycerol or protein concentrations in plasma or their partitioning among plasma lipoproteins. Excess dietary calcium decreased body weight gains of pigs. The level of dietary cholecalciferol had no effect on body weight gain or on the concentrations of cholesterol, phospholipid, triacylglycerol or protein in plasma, or on their partitioning among plasma lipoproteins. Increased vitamin D intake resulted in increased plasma 25-hydroxycholecalciferol, whereas high dietary calcium decreased concentrations of 1,25-dihydroxy-vitamin D. Increased dietary calcium also increased plasma calcium concentrations of only plasma phospholipids and decreased growth rate, whereas excess dietary vitamin D had no effect on growth or lipid composition of plasma in growing pigs.