Amino acid metabolism covers how the body builds, breaks down, and recycles the building blocks of protein, along with the nitrogen they carry. This course works through the synthesis of each amino acid family – serine, cysteine, aspartate and asparagine, the methionine-threonine-lysine group, the branched-chain amino acids, and the aromatic amino acids including tryptophan and phenylalanine – and the diseases that result when specific enzymes in these pathways are deficient.
You’ll then cover amino acid catabolism, the central role of glutamate, and the urea cycle, including how nitrogen is safely excreted and what happens when urea cycle enzymes are deficient. The course closes with heme metabolism and iron homeostasis, and bilirubin metabolism, including the enterohepatic circulation that explains jaundice and its causes.
