A complete protein or whole protein is a food source of
protein
Proteins are large biomolecules and macromolecules that comprise one or more long chains of amino acid residues. Proteins perform a vast array of functions within organisms, including catalysing metabolic reactions, DNA replication, res ...
that contains an adequate proportion of each of the nine
essential amino acid
An essential amino acid, or indispensable amino acid, is an amino acid that cannot be synthesized from scratch by the organism fast enough to supply its demand, and must therefore come from the diet. Of the 21 amino acids common to all life form ...
s necessary in the human
diet
Diet may refer to:
Food
* Diet (nutrition), the sum of the food consumed by an organism or group
* Dieting, the deliberate selection of food to control body weight or nutrient intake
** Diet food, foods that aid in creating a diet for weight loss ...
.
Amino acid profile
The following table lists the optimal profile of the nine essential amino acids in the human diet, which comprises complete protein, as recommended by the US
Institute of Medicine's Food and Nutrition Board. The foodstuffs listed for comparison show the essential amino acid content per unit of the total protein of the food, 100g of spinach, for example, only contains 2.9g of protein (6%
Daily Value
The Reference Daily Intake (RDI) used in nutrition labeling on food and dietary supplement products in the U.S. and Canada is the daily intake level of a nutrient that is considered to be sufficient to meet the requirements of 97–98% of healthy ...
), and of that protein 1.36% is
tryptophan
Tryptophan (symbol Trp or W)
is an α-amino acid that is used in the biosynthesis of proteins. Tryptophan contains an α-amino group, an α-carboxylic acid group, and a side chain indole, making it a polar molecule with a non-polar aromatic ...
.
[(note that the examples have not been corrected for digestibility)
]
Total adult daily intake
The second column in the following table shows the amino acid requirements of adults as recommended by the World Health Organization
The World Health Organization (WHO) is a specialized agency of the United Nations responsible for international public health. The WHO Constitution states its main objective as "the attainment by all peoples of the highest possible level o ...
See also
*Protein quality
Protein quality is the digestibility and quantity of essential amino acids for providing the proteins in correct ratios for human consumption. There are various methods that rank the quality of different types of protein, some of which are outdat ...
*Protein Digestibility Corrected Amino Acid Score Protein digestibility-corrected amino acid score (PDCAAS) is a method of evaluating the quality of a protein based on both the amino acid requirements of humans and their ability to digest it.
The PDCAAS rating was adopted by the US FDA and the Fo ...
References
{{Reflist
Nutrition
Proteins as nutrients