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Originally Posted by hartbroken
What is the role of the amino acids in the cocktail of nuerotransmitter meds?
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I cant give a specific answer because you have to specify which medications, however, depending on the medication, there may be no available answer yet. Keep in mind, although neurotransmitters are within the nervous system, they need not receive all of their necessary components from within the nervous system and brain.
Quote:
Originally Posted by hartbroken
I've done some research, and it looks like amino acids help dopamine and other neurotransmitters survive. Is this true?
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This is an answerable question although the answer is very long so I'll condense it a lot. Tyrosine is the main amino acid where dopamine, adrenline and noradrenaline are synthesized from. Other amino acids, such as alanine, histidine, taurine and others are involved in the signalling pathways of dopamine receptors. At a more integrative level, lysine is heavily involved through the NAD+ salvage pathway* as lys537 is catalyzed to lys via SIRT1 (member of the Sirtuin protein family, there are 7 in total in humans). Additionally, some amino acids can function as neurotransmitters and interact with dopamine. For example, glycine is prevalent within the nucleus accumbens (part of the "reward circuit" of the brain and contains a high concentration of dopaminergic neurons).
At a broader level, you could easily say almost all amino acids are involved with dopamine directly or indirectly. This complexity is in part due to dopamine being highly prevalent throughout the brain but like all neurochemical systems, dopamine doesn't function by itself, it intersects with other neurochemical systems. Hence, any adjustment to dopamine will indirectly affect other amino acids that can indirectly regulate dopamine.
A pharmacist or doctor can answer part of your question. I say only a part of it because the answer fills textbooks, so it will take a very long time to explain and if you don't have a very solid understanding of neuroscience and molecular physiology, it'll take longer (i.e. whether you know the functional difference between dopamine receptors or common components of signalling pathways such as cAMP).
* = there are (depending where you read) roughly 8 synthesis pathways for NAD+ and the salvage pathway (or recycle pathway) is but one of them.