Amino Acid Three Letter Codes - Video Tutorials & Practice Problems

Amino Acid Three Letter Codes Concept 1

Now, amino acids can be long and take a while to write out for convenience. We're going to say amino acids can be abbreviated in two different ways. We have what's called a three letter code and what's called a one letter code for these amino acids. Now, abbreviations are commonly used and were designed to be easily memorized. So as we discuss the different types of amino acids, we'll talk about the three letter codes that we can use for them as well as the one letter code that we can use for them. This will help us to write out amino acids much more quickly and efficiently when discussing their interactions with one another. And overall, when we come to the idea of a fully functional protein.

Amino Acid Three Letter Codes Concept 2

Now, when it comes to the three letter code for amino acids, we're gonna say most three letter abbreviations are simply the first three letters of the amino acid. And when we say most amino acids, we're talking about 16 out of the 20 that leaves us four. That don't follow this rule. We're gonna say four of the three letter abbreviations are slightly altered to help identify them phonetically. And that means by sound of speech and they are asparagine which is a sn glutamine, which is GLN tryptophan, which is TRP and isoleucine which is ile. Now a way to help us remember this is that we have the phonetic three letter code and our memory tool here is that asparagine is chilling on three tropical islands. So here we have an image of three islands and on each one, asparagine has a chance of just chilling. So here we have asparagine as asparagus and I'm chilling on three tropical islands. So Asparagine A SN chillin GLN on three because this is three letter code tropical and we use Tryptophan islands. So just keep that in mind when you have to remember the four amino acids. Don't that just don't simply use the three first three letters of their names for the three letter code. Now, if we come down here, we're gonna say amino acid, three letter symbols. As we can see, we have the first three letters represent the three letter code for a majority of these amino acids except for the four that we've highlighted. So again, remember asparagine is a SN, then we have glutamine which is GLN isoleucine is ile and then tryptophan is TRP. So just remember asparagine chilling on three tropical islands, that helps you remember those forino acids are a bit different from the other 16. They don't follow the first three letters of their name when it comes to the three letter code.

Amino Acid Three Letter Codes Example 1

Match the amino acids to their appropriate three letter codes. Remember, four of our amino acids don't follow the common trend of using the first three letters of their name. The way we remember this is that we have asparagine chilling on three tropical islands. So uh three tropical islands, these would be our four amino acids. They don't follow the first three letters in terms of their three letter code. So here we'd say that asparagine would be a sn, then we'd say it here that glutamine is GLN. Here we have is sousing, which is option two. And then tryptophan. Tryptophan would be trip which would be option four. The remaining ones follow the first three letters of their name to give us our three letter code. So glutamate would be glue and lucine would be lou. So this is how we would match each of the amino amino acids to the appropriate three letter codes.

Convert the following amino acids into their 3-letter codes: Glycine, Isoleucine, Valine, Tryptophan, Proline.

• A. Gly, Ile, Val, Try, Pro
• B. Gly, Iso, Val, Trp, Pro
• C. Gly, Ile, Val, Trp, Pro