By Dr. Luke Tolley, PhD in Chemistry (North Carolina) and former professor, Southern Illinois University

Not All Proteins Are Created Equal

Most people are surprised to learn that there can be huge differences in how effective proteins are for your health even when the same number of grams are listed on the nutrition label. If you want the protein that you eat to be as effective as possible, it’s important to learn about digestibility and essential amino acids.

Unsurprisingly, it turns out that some proteins are much easier for your body to use than other proteins. One reason for this is that many proteins don’t contain the right amino acids, which are what proteins are made from. Your body can make many amino acids, but there are 9 of them that you must get from your diet, called essential amino acids. Proteins that don’t contain these essential amino acids are still useful in a way, but you have to combine them with different proteins that have the missing amino acids. This is something to particularly watch out for with plant proteins since most of them are lacking in a few of the essential amino acids.

Another reason why you might not get much benefit from some proteins is digestibility. A protein might contain great amino acids, but if your body can’t digest it to get those nutrients then it doesn’t do you any good. A common example is hair or feathers. These are made of keratin, which is a protein, but not one that you can digest so there’s no usable nutrition. Seriously, don’t eat hair or feathers.

Proteins and Their PDCAAS

Let’s look at the PDCAAS values for several proteins:

Whey protein - 1
Egg protein - 1
Canola protein - 1
Beef - 0.92
Pea protein - 0.8–0.9
Peanut protein - 0.7
Rice protein - 0.5
Wheat protein - 0.42
Collagen - 0

While it’s true that you can combine different proteins to boost the PDCAAS score, it’s still an eye-opener to see that some of these proteins aren’t nearly as useful to your body as others, particularly when it comes to plant proteins. The real shocker for most people is that big zero after collagen. Collagen is interesting enough, though, to deserve its own article, so you’ll have to wait to find out about that.

By Dr. Luke Tolley, PhD in Chemistry (North Carolina) and former professor, Southern Illinois University

Not All Proteins Are Created Equal

Most people are surprised to learn that there can be huge differences in how effective proteins are for your health even when the same number of grams are listed on the nutrition label. If you want the protein that you eat to be as effective as possible, it’s important to learn about digestibility and essential amino acids.

Unsurprisingly, it turns out that some proteins are much easier for your body to use than other proteins. One reason for this is that many proteins don’t contain the right amino acids, which are what proteins are made from. Your body can make many amino acids, but there are 9 of them that you must get from your diet, called essential amino acids. Proteins that don’t contain these essential amino acids are still useful in a way, but you have to combine them with different proteins that have the missing amino acids. This is something to particularly watch out for with plant proteins since most of them are lacking in a few of the essential amino acids.

Another reason why you might not get much benefit from some proteins is digestibility. A protein might contain great amino acids, but if your body can’t digest it to get those nutrients then it doesn’t do you any good. A common example is hair or feathers. These are made of keratin, which is a protein, but not one that you can digest so there’s no usable nutrition. Seriously, don’t eat hair or feathers.