L-Theanine VS. L-Tyrosine | Which is Better for Focus and Stress?

Is there a way that the amino acids theanine and tyrosine could work together for brain function? So let's get into that. Hey, I'm Dr. A. I use this channel to answer questions, and we get a lot of questions about amino acid therapies. First off, yes, there's a lot of T-named aminos, and so they can get a little bit confusing. But what we want to focus on today are theanine, like TH, and then tyrosine, TY. I wanted to talk about them together because they can have a collaborative effect that can be really, really useful for mood, mood support, focus, et cetera. So the first thing is they're amino acids. What does that mean? Well, they come generally speaking from the proteins that we eat because proteins are made up of long strings of amino acids. So we get them generally from protein unless it's a supplement or something like that. And normally amino acids are used by the body to make, you know, enzymes and structural proteins and other things of that nature. But sometimes the nervous system will use amino acids and we call them biogenic amines. And so in this case, the theanine and the tyrosine go to 2 different pathways and, and 2 different locations in the brain, but they can actually help to balance one another out. So how in the world would that work? Tyrosine can go into your body and if it's not used anywhere for structural purposes, it can either support your thyroid hormone production because it's a skeleton for thyroid Or in the brain, tyrosine can help with catecholamine production, which is dopamine and norepinephrine, mostly in the central nervous system, and then epinephrine in the peripheral nervous system, although there's a little bit of crossover with all of those. Now, dopamine, norepinephrine in the central nervous system will help you with focus and attention and things of that nature. Theanine works in a number of places, but one place that's very important that it works is a separate excitatory neurotransmitter area. Called the glutamate class of receptors. And these don't have anything directly to do with catecholamines, but they feel like catecholamines. So if you activate your glutamate receptor categories with glutamate, you will also get an excitatory set of actions in your brain. And so a lot of times people will have too much glutamate going on, let's say, and they'll blame it on their dopamine or something like that, or vice versa. So what does theanine do to help me in modulation? Well, theanine goes over, and if you picture your glutamate receptors, which if we turn them on, make more excitatory activity in your brain, they can even be inflammatory, glutamate can. Theanine will come along and sit at the receptors in the glutamate class of neurotransmitter receptors, and it will modulate the receptor. It doesn't shut it off, but it modulates, it helps it so it's not hyperexcitable. So in a lot of people who have this very potentially even fatigued feeling, but also wired at the same time. So they sort of like, it's like they, they would really love to sleep, but their brain won't shut off or settle down. The theanine actually can help to regulate the glutamate class of receptors, which can make you feel kind of wired and help with balancing them. And then you say, well, if tyrosine and the catecholamines are working somewhere else, why would that help me to have theanine calming the glutamate class of receptors down as well? Well, what happens is that when your brain is working and if you're Your brain is working one way or the other. It's always working in a dynamic balance. And so we have excitatory neurotransmission and inhibitory neurotransmission, and they're never all on or all off. They sort of ebb and flow. So if I need to be really focused and get some work done and be awake and all that stuff, my brain is going to try and light up the excitatory side of my neurotransmitters more than the inhibitory side so I can get my work done and focus, et cetera. When I am doing that, It's never just the dopamine or norepinephrine or just the glutamate or just whatever. It's the collaborative effect. But one of the problems that will happen is if I have neuroinflammation or I have certain other underlying neurological or psychiatric things going on, I may have too much activity in the glutamate area making excitatory activity and not enough in the catecholamine area. And so they get out of balance. So I still feel activated, but I might lose some of my focus. For example. So in some people who experience like this, they will do a combination of tyrosine to help with the formation of the dopamine and norepinephrine, and then theanine to help calm down the glutamate class of receptors so that they become more in balance. So you're feeding both systems, but you're modulating the usually overexcited glutamate class. So this is why theanine and tyrosine are often used together, and it's why they can help to balance one another out because people always ask about, well, what are the cautions, you know, with these sorts of things? With tyrosine and creating more catecholamines, the biggest concern would be if you took too much tyrosine, you would be, you'd have too much catecholamine and you may feel like you drank a pot of coffee or jittery or something of that nature. If you have too much glutamate activity, you kind of feel the same way. It's hard to kind of separate them out. But in many people that have inattention or focus problems, et cetera, they do better by downregulating Downmodulating glutamate with the use of theanine, the Th1, and then feeding the catecholamines through dopamine, norepinephrine, through tyrosine, the Tyr1, and those 2 working together better. Theanine doses are usually in hundreds of milligrams. Tyrosine doses, I usually have people try 500 to 1,000 as a test dose, but in inattentive disorders, people can take a lot more. And there again, you should work with somebody if you're going to take high doses of any of these things as a practitioner. This is just generally our experience to answer the question that was asked. All right, I'm Dr. A. I hope that answers the question, and we're going to do a bunch more content on amino acids and how they work in the body, in the brain, et cetera. But until then, take a look at some other links we'll put up here. Take a look at the main channel. Please do comment, subscribe, all of the good things. If you haven't subscribed, please join the community. We're really growing and we appreciate all of you. I'll see you all in the next video.