Sterols of West Coast Seaweed

As an approach to establish the phylogenetic distribution of sterols in plants of the southwest and western United States, sea weed collected and combined from several beaches along the west coast from Los Angeles to Seattle was shown to contain a unique sterol profile of at least 10 compounds. Animal cholesterol is a significant component of the phytosterol mixture which contains fucosterol as one of the major compounds. The sterols were identified by their chromatographic (GC and HPLC) and spectral (MS and NMR) characteristics.