JEE Main 2024 · 9 April · morning · Numerical answer · +4 / −1

Total number of essential amino acid among the given list of amino acids is ________.
Arginine, Phenylalanine, Aspartic acid, Cysteine, Histidine, Valine, Proline

Answer and solution

Answer 4

Solution

Chemistry ma’am · 3 steps

Go by the NCERT list of ten essential amino acids and tick off each name against it.

  1. What essential means. An essential amino acid cannot be made by the body, so it must come from food. NCERT lists ten: valine, leucine, isoleucine, arginine, lysine, threonine, methionine, phenylalanine, tryptophan and histidine.
  2. Memory aid. Remember them as PVT TIM HALL: Phenylalanine, Valine, Threonine, Tryptophan, Isoleucine, Methionine, Histidine, Arginine, Leucine, Lysine.
    Amino acidIn the list of ten?Type
    ArginineYesessential
    PhenylalanineYesessential
    Aspartic acidNonon-essential
    CysteineNonon-essential
    HistidineYesessential
    ValineYesessential
    ProlineNonon-essential
  3. So. Arginine, phenylalanine, histidine and valine are essential, so the count is 4.

The common slip: 3. Leaving out arginine because it is called semi-essential gives 3, but NCERT counts it among the ten essential amino acids.

The idea to keep. For JEE, use the NCERT list of ten essential amino acids, PVT TIM HALL. Arginine and histidine count as essential here, even though biology books sometimes call them semi-essential.

Answer from the NTA final answer key. Solution by PrepWiser.

Study Carbohydrates & Biomolecules

Asked about 150 times in JEE Main since 2020. This question is from 2024.