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Amino acid: Quick Facts

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Diagram showing two peptide links, each with atoms labeled for oxygen, carbon, nitrogen, and hydrogen. A dotted line represents a hydrogen bond connecting the two peptide links, illustrating chemical bonding between them.
Diagram showing three glycine molecules undergoing a condensation reaction to form a tripeptide chain, with two water molecules released as byproducts.
Diagram of a DNA polynucleotide chain showing linked deoxyribose sugars, phosphate groups, and nitrogenous bases (adenine, guanine, cytosine, thymine), with an inset comparing ribose and uracil in RNA.
Diagram showing the basic structure and expression of a gene, with DNA made of exons and introns, transcription to RNA, splicing to form mRNA, translation into an amino acid chain, and posttranslational modification to form a protein.
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Diagram showing metabolic pathways for amino acid biosynthesis, divided into families: glutamate, aspartate, serine, pyruvate, shikimate, and histidine. Amino acids, underlined to indicate protein components, branch from intermediate compounds, with arrows showing synthesis relationships. Some intermediates and side products are labeled, and related amino acids are grouped by precursor molecules.
Figure 4: Enzyme defects in disorders of the amino acids phenylalanine and tyrosine.
A flowchart illustrating protein and amino acid metabolism, showing how dietary proteins are digested and absorbed into the body's amino acid pool, which is then used for building tissue and plasma proteins, creating amino acid derivatives, energy metabolism, and excretion of waste products like urea.
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Dorothy Maud Wrinch
British-American mathematician and biochemist
Carl Sagan
Carl Sagan
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James P. Allison
American immunologist
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Charles Yanofsky
American geneticist