Offbeat: Why is taurine in energy drinks?

My wife recently spent two weeks in Chicago for job training – at least I hope that’s what she was there for – and she brought me back a black, tube-like, metallic bottle with 375 milliliters of a beverage called “A:M” inside. The black-raspberry flavored drink claimed to be made with “premium vodka,” caffeine, and taurine, with the alcohol by volume at 9 percent. It had cost her $6.99.

A:M was kind of like pre-made Red Bull-and-vodka with some sweet flavoring, although Red Bull has a few extras, like B vitamins.

But I didn’t understand what taurine – one of several amino acids I buy in pill form at GNC – was doing there with caffeine in “A:M,” or in all those other energy drinks, whether they are made with or without alcohol.

So I decided to learn a little more about taurine. To properly research taurine, I had to wade through intriguing academic articles like, “Enrichment of Amadori products derived from the nonenzymatic glycation of proteins using microscale boronate affinity chromatography.”

To be honest, I skipped that one.

Another article I saw was entitled, “Taurine normalizes blood levels and urinary loss of selenium, chromium, and manganese in rats chronically consuming alcohol.” Good title. No need to read the abstract. And those rats ought to be cut off now, bartender.

Some of the research I saw seemed to suggest that alcohol-induced liver damage in laboratory rats was partially reversed by taurine, but the research did not appear to be conclusive, or, for most folks, readable.

Then I took a detour into the mainstream. WebMD.com said that taurine is “possibly effective” for remedying congestive heart failure and inflammation of the liver.

Back to the academic articles. At last, I found the abstract that explained it all, from an article in a 2004 edition of a journal called “Alcoholism, Clinical And Experimental Research.” Now that’s the kind of journal you can’t wait to see in the mailbox. Seriously, I dare you to try to read an entire article.

The abstract said that the alleged purpose behind the caffeine and taurine in alcoholic beverages is “to reduce the depressant effects of alcohol on central nervous system.”

The abstract said, up until that time, no controlled studies had been done to find out if the caffeine and taurine indeed reduced the depressive effects. So the authors of the article did just such a study.

Then, at the end of the abstract, the slam dunk, the death blow: “Our findings suggest that energy drinks, at least in the tested doses, did not improve performance or reduce alterations induced by acute alcohol ingestion.”

I see this as good news. There’s no reason to dilute my vodka. So what if I have to have a cup of coffee in my other hand?

-Colin Foote Burch