Amino Acids
What are Amino Acids Good For?
Amino acids are the building blocks that make up proteins like hormones, enzymes and proteins in tissues and muscle. There are nine essential amino acids that we need to get from food; the body can make the other eleven.
There are 20 amino acids that are required for growth by the human body. From these 20 amino acids, there are tens of thousands of different protein molecules that can be formed.
Humans can produce 11 of the 20 amino acids. The other amino acids must be supplied in the food. These are called the non-essential, or "dispensable" amino acids. The other nine amino acids are called essential (indispensable) amino acids. Essential amino acids are those which cannot be manufactured by your body and must be supplied from your food. Failure to obtain enough of even 1 of the 11 essential amino acids - those that we cannot make - results in degradation of the body's proteins (muscle and so forth) to obtain the one amino acid that is needed.
Unlike fat and starch, the human body does not store excess amino acids for later use -- the amino acids must be in the food every day.
Amino Acids Production
Non Essential (Dispensable) Amino Acids. The 10 amino acids that we can produce are alanine, asparagine, aspartic acid, cysteine, glutamic acid, glutamine, glycine, proline, serine and tyrosine. Tyrosine is produced from phenylalanine, so if the diet is deficient in phenylalanine, tyrosine will be required as well. Plants, of course, must be able to make all the amino acids.
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Essential (Indispensable) Amino Acids. The essential amino acids are arginine (required for the young, but not for adults), histidine, isoleucine, leucine, lysine, methionine, phenylalanine, threonine, tryptophan, and valine. These amino acids are required. Concentrated amino acids are necessary during periods of intense physical activity or stress. Suggested to promote your heart health, lung function and circulatory system health. |
Foods that contain a balanced combination of all the essential and nonessential
amino acids in the exact amounts required by the body for growth are called "complete
proteins." If an essential amino acid is missing, the body must break
down its own proteins to obtain it. To prevent muscle cell breakdown, dietary protein
must supply all the essential amino acids. The complete proteins are those that come from
animal sources such as 
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