Protease
Snips proteins into amino acids.
Workbench
- Works on
- Proteins
- Leaves
- Short pieces and single amino acids
- Made by
- Your stomach (pepsin) and your pancreas (trypsin, chymotrypsin and friends).
- Works in
- Stomach (pepsin), then the small intestine (from the pancreas).
- Sound
- SNIP!
On the bench
Protease (Scissors)
A short piece of egg-white protein
Pick a link and cut it with the scissors.
How it works
A protein is a long chain of amino acids, folded up like a dropped necklace. About 20 kinds of amino acid turn up in the proteins you eat, and the order they come in is the difference between egg white and steak.
Proteases cut the links between amino acids, called peptide bonds. Pepsin starts in the stomach, where it works best in acid. The pancreas sends a second wave of proteases into the small intestine, and the lining finishes off the last short pieces.
AnnouncerPepsin has no handles. Please stop asking it to cut paper.
Your pancreas makes its proteases switched off. They only switch on in the small intestine, so they don’t snip the pancreas.
The off switch is called a zymogen: the tool ships with its safety guard on.
Egg
Milk (it has protein too)
Beans
The rest of the kit
Lipase
Lactase
Alpha-galactosidase
Bromelain
PapainSome food has no tool at all. That’s the buffet.
Coming up next on Channel GG
Amylase
Chips starch into sugars. Starts in your mouth.
