Turkey is the star of the most famous dinner of the year; it is also the victim of a myth that persists every holiday season. At the end of Thanksgiving dinner, there's a good chance that someone will mention that a molecule called tryptophan is the culprit for the post-feast drowsiness.
The science seems sound enough. Turkey contains tryptophan, which is a precursor for serotonin, a neurotransmitter. In turn, serotonin produces melatonin, a hormone that helps regulate sleep. This myth perpetuates, like many others, because it is based on a huge oversimplification of the truth. On the most fundamental level, tryptophan is an essential amino acid required to make many different proteins in the body. Our bodies can't produce tryptophan, so we have to get it from the foods we eat.
