Is D-Alanine Natural? Unpacking the Surprising Origins of This Amino Acid
                                
                                
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                                    4 min read                                
                            
                                D-alanine is a naturally occurring amino acid, not an artificial invention, but its natural distribution is fundamentally different from the L-alanine found ubiquitously in human proteins. This makes its role in biology unique and a key aspect of how organisms function at a microbial level.