Lipids of bovine adrenal plasma membranes.

The lipid composition of a membrane fraction from bovine adrenal cortex was determined. This preparation has the capacity to bind adrenocorticotropic hormone and is enriched in adenylate cyclase and 5'-nucleotidase. The adrenal plasma membranes have a significantly higher lipid content (54.8%) than bovine liver plasma membranes and a surprisingly low proportion of this lipid is cholesterol (4.2%). The phospholipids comprise 76.4% of the total lipids and their composition if very similar to that of bovine liver membranes with the exception of sphingomyelin which comprises only 4.5% of the phospholipids in the adrenal preparation.