alanine vs amino acid

alanine and amino acid both are nouns.

Word	Noun	Adjective	Verb	Adverb
alanine	Yes	No	No	No
amino acid	Yes	No	No	No

As nouns, amino acid is a hypernym of alanine; that is, amino acid is a word with a broader meaning than alanine:

alanine: a crystalline amino acid that occurs in many proteins
amino acid: organic compounds containing an amino group and a carboxylic acid group

Other hypernyms of alanine include aminoalkanoic acid.

alanine (noun)	amino acid (noun)
a crystalline amino acid that occurs in many proteins	organic compounds containing an amino group and a carboxylic acid group