How does the body remove triglycerides?

Answer 1

Triglycerides

In short, triglycerides are the principal fats, or lipids, a mixture of fatty acids and glycerol, circulating in the blood. Like cholesterol, triglycerides, as a normal substance found in the bloodstream, are necessary for life itself. They are chains of high-energy fatty acids providing much of the fuel needed for body cells to function.

A molecule of triglyceride is composed of a backbone of glycerol (an alcohol) to which three fatty acids ("tri") are bound. Any combination of saturated, monounsaturated, or polyunsaturated fatty acids can be in a triglyceride molecule.

A good way to envision a triglyceride molecule is to look at your hand. Hold out the three center fingers and fold back the thumb and little finger. The three fingers are the three fatty acids and your hand is the glycerol. As the three fingers are different, so the three fatty acids in a triglyceride can be different. The fatty acids can be long or short, saturated (stiff) or unsaturated (bendable).

Triglycerides are included in such substances as:

• body fat
• cooking oil
• lard
• butter, and
• beef fat.

As found in the bloodstream, triglycerides are fats being transported from intestines to body cells. They may originate from two sources:

• the food you eat, mainly sugar, animal products and saturated fat (sweets, red meat, dairy) and/or be manufactured within the body by
• the liver itself -- especially during times, when dietary fats are not available.

Dietary (food) fats, are absorbed through the gut. They assemble in the intestines into special packets called chylomicrons, and then are delivered through the bloodstream to the liver, where they are processed.

One of the main jobs of the liver is to make sure that all the tissues of the body receive the triglycerides they need to function at optimal levels. Whenever possible (i.e., for about 8 hours after a meal), the liver takes up dietary triglycerides from the chylomicrons produced in the intestines.

However, since fats are not soluble in water and, because the liquid part of blood is made up with water, the liver packages triglycerides, along with special proteins, into tiny packages -spheres called very low density lipoprotein, or VLDL. In this form, they are released into the circulation and delivered to the cells of the body.

The body’s cells remove triglycerides from the VLDLs only when they need them. Any excessive amounts of triglycerides, or VLDLs, in the bloodstream just float there - causing problems.