If you follow a high cholesterol diet or eat too many eggs a day, your serum cholesterol can be high.   But taking Chlorella, a type of single-cell green algae as a supplement can help you to maintain total cholesterol (LC) and low density lipoprotein cholesterol (LDL-C) while increasing the good cholesterol - high density lipoprotein cholesterol (HDL-C), according to a new study.

The study results show that total serum cholesterol, LDL-C and HDL-C increased by 3.5%, 1.7% and 8.3%, respectively, in participants who took the Chlorella supplement, compared to 9.8%, 14.3% and 3.8% respectively in participants taking placebo. 

In the study, 34 participants were assigned to eat 3 eggs with 510 mg of cholesterol and take five grams of Chlorella or placebo each day for four weeks.

The results indicate that Chlorella can help maintain a desired lipid profile - low bad cholesterol and high good cholesterol.   Chlorella contains high amounts of protein (45%) and some people use it as a food.  (David Liu)

Source: Kim S, Kim J, Lim Y, Kim YJ, Kim JY, Kwon O.  A dietary cholesterol challenge study to assess Chlorella supplementation in maintaining healthy lipid levels in adults: a double-blinded, randomized, placebo-controlled study.  Nutr J. 2016 May 13;15(1):54. doi: 10.1186/s12937-016-0174-9.