Amino Acids in Hair Products
Everything I have read about amino acids in hair products has been conflicting. So I did a little digging and here’s what I found out. ©Science-y Hair Blog 2013 What Are Amino Acids: Amino acids are very small molecules, they’re not even “proteins” on their own, they’re the constituents of proteins formed from an amine group (nitrogen-containing, and all things proteinaceous contain nitrogen), a carboxylic acid group (carbon, hydroxide or “OH” and oxygen) and a side chain with a varied number of carbons, nitrogens, hydrogens, occasionally sulfur. To have a protein, you put these amino acids together. ©Science-y Hair Blog 2013 Where Are They: In hair, there are many amino acids (one source I have lists 20). The cuticle of hair – it’s multi-layered outer coating of “scales,” contains more amino acids than in the inner parts of the hair fiber - partly because proteins break down into amino acids and there is always protein being broken down at the cuticle. The outermost layer of cuticle (...