Amino Acids and Protein Building

Amino acids are the building blocks of proteins. Each amino acid has the same basic structure. A central carbon atom, called the alpha carbon, is bonded to an amino group, a carboxyl group, and a hydrogen atom.

Each amino acid also has an R group, or side chain, attached to the central carbon. Th...

Amino acids are organic compounds that are predominantly made up of carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, and nitrogen. Although there are hundreds of amino acids, there are twenty that function as building blocks of proteins. These twenty amino acids are often referred to by their three or one-letter abbreviations.

All amino acids have a central car...