stumped! 5 hour energy drink and l-phenylalanine
 

Ok, I have posted before about the benefits we see from the 5-hour energy drink. Within ten minutes, we can be back "on". It is very strange. I've looked and researched into why that might be, scrutinizing the ingredients on the list (lots of B vitamins), but still dont' get it.

It can't be the caffeine, there's not that much in it (they say the equivalent of a cup of coffee). It can't be the B vitamins: we have done a trial and taken those independently without the same effect. And we don't think it's the other ingredients, since we have supplemented with those in the past as well and not experienced anything close to the benefits seen with the 5-Hour drink. The effects had to come from something else in the drink.

Then today I looked deeper: it contains l-phenylalanine, which I knew already. But I didn't really research what all LP, as I call it, can do. LP is a precurser to tyrosine which is a precurser to dopamine. LP readily crosses the BBB. LP was studied quite a bit in decades past for its effect on depression. LP effects not only dopamine, but most of the other neurotransmitters as well, and apparently in a good way. :)

The best part: you can buy this stuff OTC. Here's a link to one place that sells it (no doubt there are others, I just found this one first and have no ties to it whatsoever), note the text discussing LP. http://www.healingedge.net/store/product1401.html

I even read on another site that LP has been used to treat vitiligo, which several people here have noted they deal with as well as PD. Oh, and LP is related to the production of melanin, which relates to sleep (and probably vitiligo as well?).

Has anyone tried supplementing with LP and if so, how did it work? We are considering trying this. In my view, we are already taking one form of manmade dopamine (sinemet) which doesn't really work all that well, and takes forever to take effect. What harm could come from trying another?

Anyone already been there, done this?

I think it is the tyrosine+ B6 (which is high) and the taurine.

Liquid delivery typically is absorbed faster too.

I was thinking about taking OTC phenylalanine but then I saw it was contraindicated when taking Azilect. But I eat food sources with LP all the time. So, I am confused.

azilect conflict
 

Our neuro told us that to cover their a@!, drug makers go further than really necessary...for example, you are not supposed to eat certain cheeses if taking azilect...our neuro told us that you would have to eat the equivalent of a wheel of cheese to have a problem, so...we take some of the contraindication warnings lightly. Of course, food conflict is one thing, drug conflicts we take more seriously.

But still, we are really thinking about trying this. We're already getting LP in the 5-hour energy drink, and there's no warning on there that I have seen about not drinking it if you are taking MAO inhibitors, so taking LP in a different form (capsule) instead of the drink should not make too much of a difference as long as the doses were about the same.

l-Phenylalanine and l(levo-)DOPA (Dihydroxyphenylalanine)
 

The sequence of physiological reactions leading to dopamine is;

l-phenylalanine -> l-tyrosine -> l-DOPA -> dopamine.

Humans can't make l-phenylalanine, it has to be provided in the diet, however we can make l-tyrosine, although it is present in dietary protein.

If you eat food with adequate protein in it you get plenty of l-phenylalanine and l-tyrosine in your diet from the breakdown of the protein into its amino acids.

Healthy dopaminergic neurons can perform all three of these reactions provided there are adequate enzymes and co-factors. As I understand it, in PD the problem is the loss of healthy neurons, not a lack of either l-phenylalanine or l-tyrosine for dopamine production.

A question to RLSmi !
 

But I understand that L-dopa treatment implies that L-dopa is converted to dopamine by same sick neurons? If so why these cells fail to do the
l-phenylalanine -> l-tyrosine -> l-DOPA conversion?

Unfortunately, this product does not list the exact amounts of
amino acids on the label. They are all lumped together along with the undisclosed amount of caffeine, as a proprietary mixture.

We have a current thread on this product on PN with discussion.
It revolves around the fact that most of the ingredients are not listed in a useful manner.

So we do NOT know how much of the various aminos (except the B6) are in there.
one of our posters at PN found a website that did discover how much caffeine was in the regular red bottle.... 130 or so milligrams.

When products are secretive like this, it is impossible to know what is doing what etc.

http://neurotalk.psychcentral.com/thread165495.html

Imad,
As I understand, the remaining few healthy dopaminergic neurons can't keep up with the need for dopamine because the first and second reactions which produce tyrosine and DOPA are rate-limiting, or slower. However, as long as there are some neurons still functioning, they can convert exogenous l-DOPA to dopamine by that faster final reaction.

huh?
 

OK, so why does it take so much longer for our ldopa (sinemet) to take effect than it does the 5-hour drink? And I mean, it' s a huge difference! With that analysis, it should actually take longer for the drink to have an effect, since those sick dopamine neurons are having to go through three conversions (LP-tyrosine-ldopa-dopamine) instead of just one (ldopa-dopamine).

We are wondering if we might shouldn't instead be looking at the drink's impact on epinephrine as the causative factor for us...