CARBOHYDRATES

The roles of carbohydrate in the body includes providing energy for working muscles, providing fuel for
the central nervous system, enabling fat metabolism, and preventing protein from being used as
energy. Carbohydrate is the preferred source of energy or fuel for muscle contraction and biologic
work.
Foods containing carbohydrate are in the grains, fruit, and milk groups. Vegetables have a small
amount of carbohydrate.
After carbohydrate is eaten, it is broken down into smaller units of sugar (including glucose, fructose
and galactose) in the stomach and small intestine. These small units of sugar are absorbed in the small
intestine and then enter the bloodstream where they travel to the liver. Fructose and galactose are
converted to glucose by the liver. Glucose is the carbohydrate transported by the bloodstream to the
various tissues and organs, including the muscles and the brain, where it will be used as energy.

Carbohydrate spares the use of protein as an energy source. When

carbohydrate consumption is inadequate, protein is broken down to make glucose to maintain a
constant blood glucose level. However, when proteins are broken down they lose their primary role as
building blocks for muscles. In addition, protein breakdown may result in an increased stress on the
kidneys, where protein byproducts are excreted into the urine.
Finally, glucose is essential for the central nervous system. The brain primarily uses glucose as its
energy source, and a lack of glucose can result in weakness, dizziness, and low blood glucose
(hypoglycemia). Reduced blood glucose during exercise decreases performance and could lead to
mental as well as physical fatigue.
Carbohydrates in the Body
All living cells contain glucose. For glucose to enter the cells it needs help from a hormone called
insulin. Insulin acts as gatekeeper and is released once carbohydrate is ingested. It signals the cells to
absorb the glucose. The glucose is then used for energy, stored in the liver and the muscles as
glycogen, or stored as fat.

Glycogen stores are essential

for athletic performance, because they serve as an energy reservoir when blood glucose levels are
decreased due to high intensity exercise or inadequate carbohydrate intake. Glycogen stores become
depleted as the intensity and duration of the exercise increases. It is imperative for the athlete,
whether a sprinter or endurance athlete, to restore glycogen by consuming carbohydrate on a regular

basis.
A well-nourished adult can store approximately 500 grams or 2000 kcal of carbohydrates. Of this,
approximately 400 grams are stored as muscle glycogen, 90-110 grams as liver glycogen, and 25
grams circulate in the blood as glucose. When the body needs more glucose than is available in
bloodstream to support energy demands, glycogen stores are used to raise blood glucose levels.
However, it is important to note that the glycogen stored in muscle is used directly by that
muscle during exercise, it cannot borrow glycogen from other resting muscles.
Glycogen stores are a readily available source of energy to support the demands of physical activity
and exercise. How quickly glycogen stores might be depleted depends on the duration and intensity of
the exercise. For low intensity exercise (distance running etc.) glycogen stores can last as long as 90
minutes. For prolonged high intensity exercise, glycogen stores can provide energy for approximately
20 minutes.
Because glycogen is readily used as fuel source during exercise, it is important to optimize glycogen
stores before exercise and replenish them after exercise. Glycogen stores are optimized by consuming
a high carbohydrate diet (~60% of total kcal from carbohydrates). Eat more fruit, vegetables, and
grains to include more carbohydrate in the diet. For diet recommendations see Pre/During/Post game
meal.
The diagram below shows the impact of diet on muscle glycogen content throughout 3 days with 2
hour training bouts (indicated by the dotted lines) daily. Athletes were divided into two groups, one
receiving a low carbohydrate diet and the other a high carbohydrate diet. With the high carbohydrate
diet (red line), glycogen levels were almost completely replenished after each training bout. In
contrast, the low carbohydrate diet (black line) did not replenish the glycogen and subsequent bouts of
training decreased glycogen stores progressively. Athletes on the low carbohydrate diet most likely had
very little energy in the final 2-hour exercise bout.
LIPIDS
Lipid: Another word for "fat." (Please see the various meanings of fat.) A lipid is chemically defined as a substance that is
insoluble in water and soluble in alcohol, ether, and chloroform.
Lipids are an important component of living cells. Together with carbohydrates and proteins, lipids are the main constituents of
plant and animal cells.
Cholesterol and triglycerides are lipids. Lipids are easily stored in the body. They serve as a source of
fuel and are an important constituent of the structure of cells.

Lipids include fatty acids, neutral fats, waxes and steroids (like cortisone). Compound lipids (lipids
complexed with another type of chemical compound) comprise the lipoproteins, glycolipids and
phospholipids. Lipids are molecules that can be extracted from plants and animals using nonpolar
solvents such as ether, chloroform and acetone. Fats (and the fatty acids from which they are made)
belong to this group as do other steroids, phospholipids forming cell membrane components etc.
Hydrolyzable/Non-hydrolyzable lipids
Lipids that contain a functional group ester are hydrolysable in water. These include neutral fats,
waxes, phospholipids, and glycolipids.
Nonhydrolyzable lipids lack such functional groups and include steroids and fat-soluble vitamins (e.g.
A, D, E, and K). Fats and oils are composed of triacylglycerols or triglycerides. These are composed of
glycerol (1,2,3-trihydroxypropane) and 3 fatty acids to form a triester. Triglycerides are found in blood
tests. Complete hydrolysis of triacylglycerols yields three fatty acids and a glycerol molecule.
Fatty acids
Fatty acids are long chain carboxylic acids (typically 16 or more carbon atoms) which may or may not
contain carbon-carbon double bonds. The number of carbon atoms are almost always an even number
and are usually unbranched. Oleic acid is the most abundant fatty acid in nature.

The membrane that surrounds a cell is made up of proteins and lipids. Depending on the membranes
location and role in the body, lipids can make up anywhere from 20 to 80 percent of the membrane,
with the remainder being proteins. Cholesterol, which is not found in plant cells, is a type of lipid that
helps stiffen the membrane. Image Credit: National Institute of General Medical Sciences
Waxes/fats and oils
These are esters with long-chain carboxylic acids and long-alcohols. Fat is the name given to a class of
triglycerides that appear as solid or semisolid at room temperature, fats are mainly present in animals.
Oils are triglycerides that appear as a liquid at room temperature, oils are mainly present in plants and
sometimes in fish.
Mono/poly unsaturated and saturated
Those fatty acids with no carbon-carbon double bonds are called saturated. Those that have two or
more double bonds are called polyunsaturated. Oleic acid is monounsaturated.
Saturated fats are typically solids and are derived from animals, while unsaturated fats are liquids and
usually extracted from plants.
Unsaturated fats assume a particular geometry that prevents the molecules from packing as efficiently
as they do in saturated molecules. Thus the boiling points of unsaturated fats is lower.
Synthesis and function of lipids in the body
Lipids are utilized or synthesized from the dietary fats. There are in addition numerous biosynthetic
pathways to both break down and synthesize lipids in the body.
There are, however, some essential lipids that need to be obtained from the diet. The main biological
functions of lipids include storing energy as lipids may be broken down to yield large amounts of
energy. Lipids also form the structural components of cell membranes and form various messengers
and signalling molecules within the body.

Nucleic acids

A comparison of the two principal nucleic acids: RNA (left) and DNA (right), showing
the helices and nucleobases each employs.

The Swiss scientist Friedrich Miescher discovered nucleic acids (DNA) in 1869.[1] Later, he raised the
idea that they could be involved in heredity.[2]
Nucleic acids are biopolymers, or large biomolecules, essential for all known forms of life. Nucleic
acids, which include DNA (deoxyribonucleic acid) and RNA (ribonucleic acid), are made from monomers
known as nucleotides. Each nucleotide has three components: a 5-carbon sugar, a phosphate group,
and a nitrogenous base. If the sugar is deoxyribose, the polymer is DNA. If the sugar is ribose, the
polymer is RNA.
Together with proteins, nucleic acids are the most important biological macromolecules; each are
found in abundance in all living things, where they function in encoding, transmitting and expressing
genetic informationin other words, information is conveyed through the nucleic acid sequence, or the
order of nucleotides within a DNA or RNA molecule. Strings of nucleotides strung together in a specific
sequence are the mechanism for storing and transmitting hereditary, or genetic information via protein
synthesis.

Nucleic acids were discovered by Friedrich Miescher in 1869.[3] Experimental studies of nucleic acids
constitute a major part of modern biological and medical research, and form a foundation for genome
and forensic science, as well as the biotechnology and pharmaceutical industries.[4][5][6]
Occurrence and nomenclature[7]
The term nucleic acid is the overall name for DNA and RNA, members of a family of biopolymers,[8] and
is synonymous with polynucleotide. Nucleic acids were named for their initial discovery within the
nucleus, and for the presence of phosphate groups (related to phosphoric acid). [9] Although first
discovered within the nucleus of eukaryotic cells, nucleic acids are now known to be found in all life
forms as well as some nonliving entities, including within bacteria, archaea, mitochondria, chloroplasts,
viruses and viroids.[10] All living cells contain both DNA and RNA (except some cells such as mature red
blood cells), while viruses contain either DNA or RNA, but usually not both. [11] The basic component of
biological nucleic acids is the nucleotide, each of which contains a pentose sugar (ribose or
deoxyribose), a phosphate group, and a nucleobase.[12] Nucleic acids are also generated within the
laboratory, through the use of enzymes[13] (DNA and RNA polymerases) and by solid-phase chemical
synthesis. The chemical methods also enable the generation of altered nucleic acids that are not found
in nature,[14] for example peptide nucleic acids.
Molecular composition and size[15]
Nucleic acids are generally very large molecules. Indeed, DNA molecules are probably the largest
individual molecules known. Well-studied biological nucleic acid molecules range in size from 21
nucleotides (small interfering RNA) to large chromosomes (human chromosome 1 is a single molecule
that contains 247 million base pairs[16]).
In most cases, naturally occurring DNA molecules are double-stranded and RNA molecules are singlestranded.[17] There are numerous exceptions, howeversome viruses have genomes made of doublestranded RNA and other viruses have single-stranded DNA genomes,[18] and, in some circumstances,
nucleic acid structures with three or four strands can form.[19]
Nucleic acids are linear polymers (chains) of nucleotides. Each nucleotide consists of three
components: a purine or pyrimidine nucleobase (sometimes termed nitrogenous base or simply base),
a pentose sugar, and a phosphate group. The substructure consisting of a nucleobase plus sugar is
termed a nucleoside. Nucleic acid types differ in the structure of the sugar in their nucleotidesDNA
contains 2'-deoxyribose while RNA contains ribose (where the only difference is the presence of a
hydroxyl group). Also, the nucleobases found in the two nucleic acid types are different: adenine,
cytosine, and guanine are found in both RNA and DNA, while thymine occurs in DNA and uracil occurs
in RNA.
The sugars and phosphates in nucleic acids are connected to each other in an alternating chain (sugarphosphate backbone) through phosphodiester linkages.[15] In conventional nomenclature, the carbons
to which the phosphate groups attach are the 3'-end and the 5'-end carbons of the sugar. This gives
nucleic acids directionality, and the ends of nucleic acid molecules are referred to as 5'-end and 3'-end.
The nucleobases are joined to the sugars via an N-glycosidic linkage involving a nucleobase ring
nitrogen (N-1 for pyrimidines and N-9 for purines) and the 1' carbon of the pentose sugar ring.
Non-standard nucleosides are also found in both RNA and DNA and usually arise from modification of
the standard nucleosides within the DNA molecule or the primary (initial) RNA transcript. Transfer RNA
(tRNA) molecules contain a particularly large number of modified nucleosides. [20]
Topology
Double-stranded nucleic acids are made up of complementary sequences, in which extensive WatsonCrick base pairing results in a highly repeated and quite uniform double-helical three-dimensional
structure.[21] In contrast, single-stranded RNA and DNA molecules are not constrained to a regular
double helix, and can adopt highly complex three-dimensional structures that are based on short
stretches of intramolecular base-paired sequences that include both Watson-Crick and noncanonical
base pairs, as well as a wide range of complex tertiary interactions. [22]
Nucleic acid molecules are usually unbranched, and may occur as linear and circular molecules. For
example, bacterial chromosomes, plasmids, mitochondrial DNA and chloroplast DNA are usually
circular double-stranded DNA molecules, while chromosomes of the eukaryotic nucleus are usually
linear double-stranded DNA molecules.[11] Most RNA molecules are linear, single-stranded molecules,
but both circular and branched molecules can result from RNA splicing reactions.[7]
Nucleic acid sequences
Main article: Nucleic acid sequence

One DNA or RNA molecule differs from another primarily in the sequence of nucleotides. Nucleotide
sequences are of great importance in biology since they carry the ultimate instructions that encode all
biological molecules, molecular assemblies, subcellular and cellular structures, organs and organisms,
and directly enable cognition, memory and behavior (See: Genetics). Enormous efforts have gone into
the development of experimental methods to determine the nucleotide sequence of biological DNA
and RNA molecules,[23][24] and today hundreds of millions of nucleotides are sequenced daily at genome
centers and smaller laboratories worldwide. In addition to maintaining the GenBank nucleic acid
sequence database, the National Center for Biotechnology Information (NCBI,
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov) provides analysis and retrieval resources for the data in GenBank and
other biological data made available through the NCBI Web site [25]
Types of nucleic acids
Deoxyribonucleic acid
Main article: DNA
Deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) is a nucleic acid containing the genetic instructions used in the
development and functioning of all known living organisms . The DNA segments carrying this genetic
information are called genes. Likewise, other DNA sequences have structural purposes, or are involved
in regulating the use of this genetic information. Along with RNA and proteins, DNA is one of the three
major macromolecules that are essential for all known forms of life. DNA consists of two long polymers
of simple units called nucleotides, with backbones made of sugars and phosphate groups joined by
ester bonds. These two strands run in opposite directions to each other and are, therefore, antiparallel. Attached to each sugar is one of four types of molecules called nucleobases (informally,
bases). It is the sequence of these four nucleobases along the backbone that encodes information. This
information is read using the genetic code, which specifies the sequence of the amino acids within
proteins. The code is read by copying stretches of DNA into the related nucleic acid RNA in a process
called transcription. Within cells DNA is organized into long structures called chromosomes. During cell
division these chromosomes are duplicated in the process of DNA replication, providing each cell its
own complete set of chromosomes. Eukaryotic organisms (animals, plants, fungi, and protists) store
most of their DNA inside the cell nucleus and some of their DNA in organelles, such as mitochondria or
chloroplasts.[1] In contrast, prokaryotes (bacteria and archaea) store their DNA only in the cytoplasm.
Within the chromosomes, chromatin proteins such as histones compact and organize DNA. These
compact structures guide the interactions between DNA and other proteins, helping control which
parts of the DNA are transcribed.
Ribonucleic acid
Main article: RNA

Ribonucleic acid (RNA) functions in converting genetic information from genes into
the amino acid sequences of proteins. The three universal types of RNA include
transfer RNA (tRNA), messenger RNA (mRNA), and ribosomal RNA (rRNA).
Messenger RNA acts to carry genetic sequence information between DNA and
ribosomes, directing protein synthesis. Ribosomal RNA is a major component of the
ribosome, and catalyzes peptide bond formation. Transfer RNA serves as the carrier
molecule for amino acids to be used in protein synthesis, and is responsible for
decoding the mRNA. In addition, many other classes of RNA are now known.
Artificial nucleic acid analogs
Main article: Nucleic acid analogues
Artificial nucleic acid analogs have been designed and synthesized by chemists, and
include peptide nucleic acid, morpholino- and locked nucleic acid, as well as glycol
nucleic acid and threose nucleic acid. Each of these is distinguished from naturally
occurring DNA or RNA by changes to the backbone of the molecule