what is leucine trigger & why is it important ?

🧬 Proteins are composed of amino acids.

 🧬 Essential amino acids are the ones that the body can’t synthesise itself and so, they need to be obtained from the diet.

 🧬 All amino acids act as building blocks of new proteins, which have many different functions, depending on the type of protein.

 💪🏼 On top of being building blocks, branched chained amino acids stimulate the anabolism (building) of muscle.

 💪🏼 Leucine is an essential, branched chain amino acid (so a pretty special one), which can alone induce muscle protein synthesis. This can be done with 2.5-3g of leucine, which is known as the leucine trigger. 

 💪🏼 In simple terms and in relation to the remaining amino acids, the leucine trigger acts as a car key, which switches on the engine (muscle protein synthesis), while the remaining amino acids are the fuel, which keep the car going (keep building the muscle). 

 🗝 If the key isn’t functional (not enough leucine), the car can’t be started, so it doesn’t matter how much fuel (remaining amino acids) it has, it won’t be able to go anywhere. This means that without sufficient leucine, muscle building is inefficient, even if you consume/synthesise enough of the remaining amino acids.

 💪🏼 I am not talking about muscle building for athletes here (although the same concept applies). Our muscles constantly break down and re-build, so the leucine trigger concept is relevant and applicable to everyone.