Question

We are ingesting …………when we eat sugarcane.
A. Glucose
B. Fructose
C. Sucrose
D. Maltose

Answer 1

Hint: Carbohydrates are macromolecules made up of a single unit or numbers of monomers joined together. Plants store carbohydrates in the form of starch, whereas, animals store in the form of glycogen.

Complete step by step answer: Carbohydrates are organic compounds composed of carbon, hydrogen, oxygen and some nitrogen and sulphur. Chemically these are polyhydroxy aldehydes or polyhydroxy ketones. Carbohydrates are the principle source of energy. Carbohydrates are divided into three major groups based on hydrolysis products or monomer units.
a. Monosaccharides - These cannot be hydrolysed further into smaller carbohydrates.
b. Oligosaccharides - These are formed by condensation of two or ten monosaccharides.
c. Polysaccharides - These are long chains of sugar having more than ten monosaccharides.
d. Sucrose is also known as table sugar, cane sugar or invert sugar. Sugarcane is a rich source of sucrose. It is a non-reducing sugar present in most of the plants. Sucrose is formed by alpha glucose and beta fructose joined together by a glycosidic bond.
Glucose is the most important and abundant sugar. It is an instantaneous source of energy, found in grapes and corn. Nervous system and RBC use only glucose for energy. Fructose is present in fruits and source of energy for sperm in semen. Maltose is a disaccharide of glucose and commonly called malt sugar.
So, the correct answer is option C.

Note: Sucrose is the major product of photosynthesis. Many birds, insects, bacteria, etc feed on this sugar to obtain energy. It is a naturally occurring carbohydrate and has been increasingly refined and consumed in all kinds of processed foods.