Amino acid symbols: Symbols that stand for the amino acids, the building blocks of protein. Each amino acid has both a three-letter symbol and a single-letter symbol. For example, the three-letter and single-letter symbols for alanine are Ala and A. The three-letter symbols (such as Ala) are much more widely used than the single letter ones (such as A).
Therefore, the following list is limited to the three-letter symbols and is further limited to those 20 alpha-amino acids specified by the genetic code:
- Alanine: Ala
- Arginine: Arg
- Asparagine: Asn
- Aspartic acid: Asp
- Cysteine: Cys
- Glutamic acid: Glu
- Glutamine: Gln
- Glycine: Gly
- Histidine: His
- Isoleucine: Ile
- Leucine: Leu
- Lysine: Lys
- Methionine: Met
- Phenylalanine: Phe
- Proline: Pro
- Serine: Ser
- Threonine: Thr
- Tryptophan: Trp
- Tyrosine: Tyr
- Valine: Val
These three-letter symbols for amino acids are used not only to refer to an individual amino acid but also to present the amino acid sequence of a polypeptide or a protein. For example, part of the sequence of insulin reads: Gly-Ile-Val-Glu-Gln-Cys-Cys-Ala-Ser-Val. The N-terminal residue of the polypeptide or protein is by convention always on the left and the sequence reads from left-to-right toward the C-terminal residue of the polypeptide or protein.
