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From: dyer@spdcc.COM (Steve Dyer)
Newsgroups: sci.med,alt.drugs,sci.bio,sci.chem
Subject: Re: Tryptophan Mystery Resolved
Message-ID: <2643@ursa-major.SPDCC.COM>
Date: 3 Jun 90 16:19:11 GMT
References: <1990Apr26.200027.29242@pmafire.UUCP> <1990Apr27.000315.2282@cunixf.cc.columbia.edu> <1990Apr27.174702.10390@pmafire.UUCP>
Reply-To: dyer@ursa-major.spdcc.COM (Steve Dyer)
Organization: S.P. Dyer Computer Consulting, Cambridge MA
Lines: 34

In article <1990Apr27.174702.10390@pmafire.UUCP> dukas@pmafire.UUCP (Steve Dukas) writes:
>>Just as Dukas couldn't understand how consuming tryptophan could have a
>>deleterious effect, I can't understand how MSG does;  but it really does, 
>>apparently.
>
>The effects you have described are that of hypertension, c(possibly) caused
>from sodium.  I tend to have a theory that that sodium coupled with an amino
>acid (MSG) will be much quicker assimilated by the body.

Izzat right, Dockor?  I'd like to know how Dukas can say such things and
expect to be taken seriously.

Here are a couple of of facts as opposed to hazy but fanciful impressions.
MSG does not cause hypertension.  Sodium as a part of the diet does not
cause acute hypertension.  (Its role in the etiology of chronic hyper-
tension is complex and still poorly understood, but there's certainly
no simple cause-effect relationship.)  It isn't even clear that MSG is
the cause of "Chinese Restaurant Syndrome".  Controlled studies in people
who report the syndrome and who avoid MSG do not experience the syndrome
in double-blind experiments.

>Besides, MSG
>is not a pure amino acid, which should not be compared to one.

MSG is the pure sodium salt of a pure amino acid.  You can't get much
purer than that.  Glutamic acid is ionized as glutamate in body fluids,
meaning that the only difference between MSG and glutamic acid is
that on a weight basis, there's more glutamate in glutamic acid
than there is in MSG.

-- 
Steve Dyer
dyer@ursa-major.spdcc.com aka {ima,harvard,rayssd,linus,m2c}!spdcc!dyer
dyer@arktouros.mit.edu, dyer@hstbme.mit.edu