Biological value

Biological value (BV) is a measure of the proportion of absorbed protein from a food which becomes incorporated into the proteins of the organism's body. It captures how readily the digested protein can be used in protein synthesis in the cells of the organism. Proteins are the major source of nitrogen in food. BV assumes protein is the only source of nitrogen and measures the proportion of this nitrogen absorbed by the body which is then excreted. The remainder must have been incorporated into the proteins of the organisms body. A ratio of nitrogen incorporated into the body over nitrogen absorbed gives a measure of protein "usability" – the BV.

Unlike some measures of protein usability, biological value does not take into account how readily the protein can be digested and absorbed (largely by the small intestine). This is reflected in the experimental methods used to determine BV.

BV uses two similar scales:

These two values will be similar but not identical.

The BV of a food varies greatly, and depends on a wide variety of factors. In particular the BV value of a food varies depending on its preparation and the recent diet of the organism. This makes reliable determination of BV difficult and of limited use — fasting prior to testing is universally required in order to ascertain reliable figures.

BV is commonly used in nutrition science in many mammalian organisms, and is a relevant measure in humans. It is a popular guideline in bodybuilding in protein choice.

For accurate determination of BV:

These conditions mean the tests are typically carried out over the course of over one week with strict diet control. Fasting prior to testing helps produce consistency between subjects (it removes recent diet as a variable).

There are two scales on which BV is measured; percentage utilization and relative utilization. By convention percentage BV has a percent sign (%) suffix and relative BV has no unit.

Biological value is determined based on this formula.

Where:

However direct measurement of N_r is essentially impossible. It will typically be measured indirectly from nitrogen excretion in urine.Faecal excretion of nitrogen must also be taken into account - this part of the ingested protein is not absorbed by the body and so not included in the calculation of BV. An estimate is used of the amount of the urinary and faecal nitrogen excretion not coming from ingested nitrogen. This may be done by substituting a protein-free diet and observing nitrogen excretion in urine or faeces, but the accuracy of this method of estimation of the amount of nitrogen excretion not coming from ingested nitrogen on a protein-containing diet has been questioned.

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