Abstract

E. I. Adeyeye^¹* and M.O.Aremu^²

An investigation into the concentrations of amino acids in the liver and heart of Cricetomys gambianus was carried out. The most abundant amino acid was Glu (12.9-13.0 g/100 g) and Leu was the most abundant essential amino acid (6.94-7.65 g/100 g). Whilst total amino acid content was 83.4-91.4 g/100 g crude protein, the total essential amino acid content was 38.6-42.2 g/100 g or 46.2-46.3% with His but 35.6-39.9 g/100 g crude protein or 42.5-43.7% without His. When compared with whole hen’s egg, Ser was the limiting amino acid in the two samples (0.38-0.47) whereas it was 1.12 (Lys) in liver and 1.26 (His) in heart. In comparison with pre-school child requirement, Leu (1.16) was limiting in liver and Thr (0.78) was limiting in heart. In comparison with provisional amino acid scoring pattern: Met+ Cys (0.95) was limiting in liver but Thr (0.66) was limiting in heart. The predicted protein efficiency ratio (P-PER) was 2.32-2.62 whereas the essential amino acid index was 1.20-1.31. Significant differences existed between the liver and the heart in their amino acid compositions and their comparisons with the whole hen’s egg at r = 0.05.

Amino acid; Liver and heart; Cricetomys gambianus

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