What the heck is Taurine

[William St]

Some people say it is an amino acid, but it is not listed in
any amino acid tables I've seen. In fact one source says it is
a chemical in the bile of a bull (from Taurus?).

Any real science on taurine?

bill

[Eric Bohlm]

William Stacy <wstacy@obase.net> wrote in
news:3E259C0B.6CB4EC11@obase.net:

> Some people say it is an amino acid, but it is not listed in
> any amino acid tables I've seen. In fact one source says it
> is a chemical in the bile of a bull (from Taurus?).

It is, chemically, an amino acid. Probably the reason you
don't see it in the tables is that it's not one of the twenty
amino acids that are coded for by DNA and incorporated into
proteins (or the twenty-three that can be isolated from
protein hydrolysates; cystine is a dimer of cysteine, and
hydroxyproline and hydroxylysine are formed by
post-translational enzymatic modification, this reaction
requiring ascorbate and being what goes awry in scurvy).

[Alf Christ]

On 15 Jan 2003 20:36:25 GMT, Eric Bohlman
<ebohlman@earthlink.net> wrote:

>It is, chemically, an amino acid. Probably the reason you
>don't see it in

Nah. Not strictly correct. It is an sulphoamino acid since it
lacks the carboxyl group. 2-aminoethanesulfonate

>the tables is that it's not one of the twenty amino acids
>that are coded for by DNA and incorporated into proteins (or
>the twenty-three that can be isolated from protein
>hydrolysates; cystine is a dimer of cysteine, and

It is made in livers from cysteine, by cysteine dioxygenase
and cysteine sulphinate decarboxylase to taurine or through
hypotaurine (a strong antioxidant, far stronger than taurine)

Searching PubMed you will find more than 10000 hits, but some
of them are about the animal :-) And a lot of them are about
taurine and alcohol, in fact a derivative of taurine that is
very promising agent against alcoholism.