 Methods LDL subclass analysis Electrophoresis will be performed using high resolution 3 polyacrylamide tube gel and the Lipoprint LDL System Quantimetrix, Redondo Beach, CA according to the manufacturers instructions.16, 17, 18 Briefly, 25 μl of sample will be mixed with 200 μl of Lipoprint Loading Gel and placed upon the upper part of the 3 polyacrylamide gel. After 30 min of photopolymerization at room temperature, electrophoresis will be performed for 60 min with 3 mA for each gel tube. Each electrophoresis chamber will involve 2 quality controls sample provided by the manufacturer. For quantification, scanning will be performed with a ScanMaker 8700 digital scanner Mikrotek Co, USA and iMac personal computer Apple Computer Inc, USA. After scanning, electrophoretic mobility Rf and the area under the curve AUC will be calculated qualitatively and quantitatively with the Lipoprint LDL system Template and the Lipoware software Quantimetrix Co, Redondo Beach, CA, respectively. The LDL subfraction will be calculated using the Rf between the very low-density lipoprotein VLDL fraction Rf 0.0 and the HDL fraction Rf 1.0. LDL is distributed from Rf 0.32 to Rf 0.64 as 7 bands, whose Rfs are 0.32, 0.38, 0.45, 0.51, 0.56, 0.6 and 0.64 LDL1 to LDL7, respectively. LDL1 and LDL2 are defined as large, buoyant LDL and LDL3 to LDL7 are defined as sd-LDL. The cholesterol concentration in mgdl of each LDL subfraction is determined by multiplying the relative AUC of each subfraction by the TC concentration of the sample the TC concentration of the sample is measured independently. The proportion of sd-LDL-cholesterol sd-LDL will be defined as the percentage of the LDL-cholesterol carried in sd-LDL i.e. bands 3 to 7. LDL peak particle diameter LDL-PPD nm will be determined using the Rf of the highest peak of the LDL bands according to the following equation proposed: LDL-PPD 1.429-Rf25. Moreover, the Lipoprint LDL System provides a mean LDL particle size nm and uses a size of 26.8 nm as a cut-off point to classify individuals into phenotypes A absence of sd-LDL particles and non-A presence of sd-LDL particles. 