Question by Mia Forsyth: How do amino acids work when they’re in diet pills?
I found these amino acid pills in the cupboard today and the bottle said they were diet supplements. How do they work as diet supplements? Like do they make you eat less or are they like laxatives? Also is 4 1000 (I don’t know if it’s mg or what) tablets too much? Because the bottle said to take 4 a day. It also says it’s a balanced blend of 20 amino acids. So what does this all mean?

Best answer:

Answer by Mich Levesque
Diet supplements” are different from “Diet Pills”

Supplements are vitamins, essentially. They are taken to supplement (replace) the vitamins, or in this case, amino acids, that you may not be getting in your day-to-day diet (not meaning to lose weight, just meaning what you eat)

Diet pills are (a hoax) supposed to help decrease appetite, make you poop, less water retention etc… they don’t work though. Sorry.

Now to answer your question about aminos…

Below is a list of some of the ways that amino acids have been used.

Arginine – has been shown to improve sperm count and sperm motility in some men.

Lysine – is used particularly for recurrent cold sores and herpes infections.

Phenylalanine – has been used in the treatment of pain and depression.

Tryptophan – this amino acid has been more studied than the others. There is an association between the level of tryptophan in the blood and arthritis. High levels of tryptophan are also found in jaundice. It has also been used in depression, particularly if insomnia is present. Oestrogen containing oral contraceptives interfere with the normal metabolism of tryptophan (this may be because of their effect in vitamin B6 which is essential for the conversion of tryptophan to serotonin.)

Histidine – has been used in rheumatoid arthritis – low levels of histidine has been found in the blood of those with rheumatoid arthritis

Tyrosine – like tryptophan and phenylalanine has been used in the treatment of depression. This amino acid is essential for the synthesis of substances called catecholamines (these include dopamine and noradrenaline) and some people who are depressed have low levels of these compounds.
It is likely that more and more uses for amino acids will become evident as research progresses.

Proteins (which contain amino acids) are essential requirement in our diet. Amino acids, essential and non-essential, are needed for the body’s structural component – bones, muscle and connective tissue and for functional aspects such as hormones and other chemicals. The range of therapeutic used for which amino acids are used is still somewhat limited it is likely that the uses will expand as we learn more about the role that amino acids play in maintaining health.

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