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Tryptophan is one of the eight essential amino acids found in the
human diet. Essential amino acids must be received in the diet from
food or dietary supplements; non-essential aminos (of which there
are 14) can be made from the essential aminos or from other
non-essential amino acids.
In any normal diet, protein based
tryptophan is believed to be the least plentiful of all 22 amino
acids. A typical diet provides only 1 to 1.5 grams a day, yet there
is quite a bit of competition in the body for available tryptophan.
It is used to make various proteins, and in people with low to
moderate intakes of vitamin B3 (niacin/ niacinamide), tryptophan may
quite possibly be used in the liver to make B3 at the expensive
ratio of 60mg tryptophan to one mg B3.
One of the most
important roles of tryptophan is the production of 5-HTP. However,
eating food that contains L-tryptophan (tryptophan) does not
significantly increase 5-HTP levels. Supplemental 5-HTP is naturally
derived from the seeds of Griffonia simplicifolia, a West African
medicinal
plant.
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