Taurine

Geschatte leestijd: 6 minuten What is taurine, where does it come from, and what does taurine do? Does it really add anything, for example, as an ingredient of an energy drink?

Taurine

Most people know taurine mainly as an ingredient of energy drinks. It is added to these because it is believed to provide more energy in various ways. It is said to provide more mental alertness. Others point to better muscle performance, faster recovery, and less fatigue. Although quite a few positive effects are attributed to this amino acid, these have not been convincingly demonstrated in well-designed studies. So, one can question whether taurine is rightfully added to so many products like energy drinks.

What is taurine?

Taurine is an amino acid, at least according to the definition most people use. It is not an essential amino acid and therefore does not necessarily need to be obtained from food. The body can also produce it from the amino acids cysteine and methionine. The amino acid taurine is mainly found in the brain, muscles, eyes, and heart. Unlike other amino acids, it cannot be used to build proteins in the body [1]. Think, for example, of building proteins in muscles. In food, we mainly find taurine in animal proteins, but not in plant proteins [2]. However, the latter can provide the amino acids that can be converted into taurine in the body.

Bull semen or bull piss?

Taurine is named after a bull (taurus) but has little to do with it. Coincidentally, the first taurine was obtained from ox bile in 1827. Originally, it was called gal-asparagine. Ten years later, it appeared in the literature under the name taurine. So, the name has nothing to do with the urine or sperm of a bull and does not originate from there.

How much taurine?

An average diet provides between 40 mg and 400 mg of taurine per day. Studies often use much larger amounts between 400 and 6,000 mg per day [3,4]. But even extreme doses of up to 10 grams per day for six months did not cause serious side effects [14]. An official safe upper limit has not (yet) been established. In energy drinks, doses of 1,000 mg to 3,000 mg are not uncommon. So, with just one can of energy drink, you can get as much as you would from a week of normal food.

Why taurine?

Why would you supplement the amount you get daily? For example, with supplements or an energy drink? That’s a damn good question. You would think that we know exactly what such an amount of taurine is good for and what benefits we can expect. Strangely enough, that’s not the case. Research into the effect of taurine under different circumstances and for different doses shows various, sometimes conflicting, results. Many of the attributed benefits have not been convincingly demonstrated in research. Personally, I suspect that adding taurine has mainly commercial reasons. People know the term and associate it in their minds with ‘energy’ because of the rise of popular energy drinks.

What does taurine do?

So let’s discuss some benefits that are attributed and what the research says about them. I won’t limit myself to effects related to energy and sports performance. Some people call taurine a ‘wonder molecule’ because of the many different positive effects it is said to have [5]. Let’s see if that reputation is justified.

Taurine and energy

Let’s start with the reason why taurine is added to energy drinks: More energy. Linked to this could be: Better athletic performance, among other things because fatigue occurs later. I won’t limit myself to studies conducted on humans. There are several studies that have looked at the effect of intake on athletic performance. Unfortunately, many of these studies combined taurine with other substances that could enhance performance [6 to 10]. Think of substances like caffeine, creatine, and fast sugars. You don’t know to what extent taurine is responsible for certain results. There are studies that looked specifically at taurine in isolation. However, these often provided too little data to draw firm conclusions.

Better performance through taurine?

In a 2010 study, cyclists received a taurine supplement (1,660 mg) one hour before cycling for 90 minutes [11]. This did not lead to improvements in performance and did not change perceived fatigue. In 2004, cyclists were able to cycle longer after receiving 6,000 mg of taurine daily for 7 days [12]. However, there was no placebo group in this study, and the study was not conducted blindly. So, you can’t rule out a placebo effect. Ten years later, researchers studied the effect of 1,000 mg of taurine 45 minutes before physical and mental exertion by soldiers [13]. This was a double-blind, placebo-controlled, and randomized trial. The researchers saw no effect of taurine on endurance, concentration, and memory.

Taurine, blood sugar, and diabetes

Taurine may help regulate your blood sugar. Chronic elevation of your blood sugar (when you haven’t eaten) can eventually lead to type 2 diabetes. Normally, insulin ensures that cells in your body, such as muscle and fat cells, can take up glucose from the blood. This can prevent high blood sugar. However, in type 2 diabetes, these cells are no longer good at recognizing insulin. In a 2012 study, rats with type 2 diabetes received a taurine supplement for 12 weeks [15]. This resulted in lower blood sugar while the diet remained the same. Other effects of diabetes also improved, such as cholesterol and the amount of fats in the blood. Preventing chronic high blood sugar could significantly reduce the risk of type 2 diabetes [16]. However, the researchers rightly point out that it is still unclear whether this effect also occurs in humans. Studies that investigated this in humans were small in size and of short duration [17]

Higher fat burning?

In the 2012 study with the cyclists, no improvement in performance was observed, but fat burning during the one and a half hours of cycling was found to be increased by 16% [11]. The influence of taurine on fat burning is only seen in studies with animals. Like a study in 2018 on mice that received a high-fat diet, with or without supplementation. In the mice that received taurine, weight gain was slower because the production of white fat cells was inhibited. So, there are indications that it can increase fat burning or decrease the production of white fat cells. Both need to be (better) confirmed in larger studies with humans.

Taurine side effects

As mentioned, there are no known doses at which taurine leads to undesirable side effects. Cases where people became unwell or even died after taking taurine did so in combination with other substances such as caffeine or sugars.

If it’s not beneficial, it won’t hurt?

Personally, I’m not entirely convinced of the added value of taurine, specifically for athletes. However, there is enough reason to believe that there could be several benefits, only these need to be confirmed in solid research. Moreover, you have to exaggerate considerably with the intake of taurine to get unpleasant side effects. Then you have to take in at least more than the studies with the highest doses. There seems to be no reason for this in terms of efficacy. So, I dare to say: If it’s not beneficial, it won’t hurt. As long as you don’t combine it with other products like caffeine and fast sugars. References:

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16. Mehdi H. Shishehbor, MPH, DO; Steven E. Nissen, MD. Articles Taurine supplementation improves glucose tolerance in an animal model of type 2 diabetes. Diabetes. 2012 Apr;61(4):841-2.
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