Alpha- galacto- sidase
Unbolts the sugars in beans.
Workbench
- Works on
- Raffinose and stachyose, the sugars in beans
- Leaves
- Galactose and sucrose
- Made by
- Not you. Microbes make it, and some supplements carry it.
- Works in
- Not made by your body: it comes from microbes, or from a capsule.
- Sound
- CLUNK!
On the bench
Alpha-galactosidase (Wrench)
Raffinose
Stachyose
Pick a link and cut it with the wrench.
How it works
Beans, lentils, cabbage and broccoli carry raffinose and stachyose: short sugars with one or two galactose beads bolted onto a sucrose (a glucose and a fructose).
Your body has no tool for that galactose bolt, so these sugars normally roll on to the colon, where the crew ferments them, gas and all. Alpha-galactosidase unbolts the galactose early, in the small intestine, so there’s less left for the crew.
AnnouncerBeans, beans. You know the rest. It’s the raffinose.
Your body doesn’t make alpha-galactosidase. Without it, bean sugars go to the colon and become the crew’s dinner, with gas.
Beans
Broccoli and cabbage
Where it clocks in
The rest of the kit
Amylase
Lipase
Lactase
Papain
BileSome food has no tool at all. That’s the buffet.
Coming up next on Channel GG
Bromelain
A protease that comes from pineapple.
