Cat food is food intended for consumption by cats. Cats have requirements for their specific dietary nutrients. Certain nutrients, including many vitamins and amino acids, are degraded by the temperatures, pressures and chemical treatments used during manufacture, and hence must be added after manufacture to avoid nutritional deficiency. The amino acid taurine, for example, which is found within meat, is degraded during processing, so synthetic taurine is normally added afterwards. Long-term taurine deficiency resulting, for example, from feeding taurine-deficient dog food, may result in retinal degeneration, loss of vision, and cardiac damage.
