moi-kilucru
Messages : 5846
Date d'inscription : 24/11/2008
Localisation : The Best in the West, MTL, QC
 |  Sujet: C. Campbell (China Study) on the Protein Myth  Dim 5 Avr - 18:10 | |
| About eight amino acids ("colored beads") that are needed for making our tissue proteins must be provided by the food we eat. They are called "essential" because our bodies cannot make them. If, like our string of beads, our food protein lacks enough of even one of these eight "essential" amino acids, then the synthesis of the new proteins will be slowed down or stopped. This is where the idea of protein quality comes into play. Food proteins of the highest quality are, very simply, those that provide, upon digestion, the right kinds and amounts of amino acids needed to efficiently synthesize our new tissue proteins. This is what that word "quality" really means: it is the ability of food proteins to provide the right kinds and amounts of amino acids to make our new proteins.
Can you guess what food we might eat to most efficiently provide the building blocks for our replacement proteins? The answer is human flesh. Its protein has just the right amount of the needed amino acids: But while our fellow men and women are not for dinner, we do get the next "best" protein by eating other animals. The proteins of other animals are very similar to our proteins because they mostly have the right amounts of each of the needed amino acids. These proteins can be used very efficiently and therefore are called "high quality." Among animal foods, the proteins of milk and eggs represent the best amino acid matches for our proteins, and thus are considered the highest quality. While the "lower quality" plant proteins may be lacking in one or more of the essential amino acids, as a group they do contain all of them
The concept of quality really means the efficiency with which food proteins are used to promote growth. This would be well and good if the greatest efficiency equaled the greatest health, but it doesn't, and that's why the terms efficiency and quality are misleading. In fact, to give you a taste of what's to come, there is a mountain of compelling research showing that "low-quality" plant protein, which allows for slow but steady synthesis of new proteins, is the healthiest type of protein. Slow but steady wins the race. The quality of protein found in a specific food is determined by seeing how fast animals would grow while consuming it. Some foods, namely those from animals, emerge with a very high protein efficiency ratio and value.
]This focus on efficiency of body growth, as if it were good health, encourages the consumption of protein with the highest "quality." As any marketer will tell you, a product that is defined as being high quality instantly earns the trust of consumers. For well over 100 years, we have been captive to this misleading language and have oftentimes made the unfortunate leap to thinking that more quality equals more health. The basis for this concept of protein quality was not well known among the public, but its impact was-and still is-highly significant.
People, for example, who choose to consume a plant-based diet will often ask, even today, "Where do I get my protein?" as if plants don't have protein. Even if it is known that plants have protein, there is still the concern about its perceived poor quality. This has led people to believe that they must meticulously combine proteins from different plant sources during each meal so that they can mutually compensate for each other's amino acid deficits. However, this is overstating the case. We now know that through enormously complex metabolic systems, the human body can derive all the essential amino acids from the natural variety of plant proteins that we encounter every day. It doesn't require eating higher quantities of plant protein or meticulously planning every meal. Unfortunately, the enduring concept of protein quality has greatly obscured this information. | |
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