The purpose of this study was to investigate the effects of diet composition on serum leptin and lipids profiles in rats. At the baseline, seven 4-week-old Sprague-Dawley rats, male, were sacrificed and the remaining rats were divided into five groups and each group was fed one of the following five dietary regiments for 2 weeks and 6 weeks;the control diet AIN76(CAL, n=2l), high-carbonhydrate(rice)(HCR, n=2l), high-carbohydrate(flour)(HCF, n=2l), high-fat(corn oil)(HFO, n=2l), high-fat(beef tallow)(HFB, n=2l). Serum leptin was determined by a double antibody ELISA assay at the baseline(n=7), 6 week(n=35) and 10 week of age(n=70). At 6 weeks of age, the increase in the Food Efficiency Ratio(FER) was related to adipocyte hyperplasia in rats on HFB diets. The serum triglyceride, total cholesterol, and LDL-cholesterol increased significantly in HFB group, and decreased in HFO group compared to control group. The HFC group showed significant increase in serum triglyceride level compared with control group. After 2 weeks and 6 weeks, noticeably high increases in epididymal adipose tissue fat cell mass and numbers were observed with the HFB fed group. Serum leptin levels increased as body weight increased over the period of time(4weeks; 1.50$pm$0.13ng/ml versus 10weeks; 2.08$pm$-.13ng/ml). And this result shows that there are 193% higher in rats fed high fat-beef tallow diet than the control diet. Serum leptin levels of the HFB group(4.01$pm$0.39mg/ml) were significantly higher than that of the HFO(2.06$pm$0.5613ng/ml), CAL(2.08$pm$0.1313ng/ml), HCR(2.41$pm$0.2113ng/ml) and HCF(2.80$pm$0.4713ng/ml) at p<0.05. The serum leptin concentration was positively correlated with the amount of epididymal fat pads(r=0.47 p<0.01), serum triglyceride(r=0.49, p<0.001), tatal cholesterol(r=0.48, p<0.001), LDL-cholesterol(r=0.58, p<0.001), atherogenic index(r=0.67, p<0.001), and inversely correlated with HDL-cholesterol(r=-0.65, p<0.001). In conclusion, the changes in composition of dietary fat and carbohydrate intake could affect changes in concentration of serum lipids and leptin. Especially, the high-fat diet with animal fat source could increase circulating leptin level. (Korean J Nutrition 34(2) : 123-131, 2001)