Amino acids are basic building blocks for
proteins and other important organic molecules.
As we will see next week, there are only
20 amino acids that all life depends on.
Generally, amino acids all have the same form:
where NH2 (the left side) is an amine group,
COOH (the right side) is a carboxyl acid group,
and R represents 20 different chemical forms
(the simplest has just H in that position).
R is the only thing that changes from
amino acid to amino acid.