Sugar is sweet and tasty.
It comes from plants. Some plants grow in warm places. Some grow in cool places. We use it in food. Do you like sweet treats?
Plants make a sweet food called sugar.
It is found in fruits like pineapples. It is also in nectar.
We get white sugar from plants. Some come from tall cane. Others come from beets.
Factories work hard to make it. They crush the plants. They wash the tiny crystals.
Then they boil the juice. This makes the sugar very pure. The sugar is clear and sweet.
Many people add sugar to food. It is a very popular treat!
Sucrose is a type of sugar. It is made of two smaller sugars. These are glucose and fructose.
Plants make sucrose to store power. You can find it in fruits like pineapples. Many fruits have more sucrose as they ripen.
We get white sugar from two plants. Some comes from sugarcane. Other sugar comes from sugar beets.
In hot areas, mills crush the cane. They make raw sugar. This is sent to factories to be refined. In cooler areas, factories work on beets.
Making white sugar is a set of steps. First, workers wash the raw sugar crystals. Next, they dissolve them into a syrup. They filter the syrup. They pass it over carbon to remove color. Then, they boil the syrup under a vacuum. This makes the sugar turn into crystals.
These crystals are pure sucrose. They are clear, sweet, and have no smell. In 2017, the world made 185 million tonnes of sugar.
Sucrose is a special kind of sugar called a disaccharide. This means it is made of two smaller sugar pieces joined together. These two pieces are called glucose and fructose.
Plants, algae, and cyanobacteria make this sugar naturally. They use it to store energy they get from sunlight. You can find sucrose in the roots, fruits, and nectar of many plants. For example, pineapple and apricot have a lot of this sugar. Other fruits like grapes or blueberries have very little.
We get the white sugar used in kitchens from two main plants. Some comes from sugarcane, which grows in hot, tropical places. Other sugar comes from sugar beets, which grow in cooler, temperate places.
In tropical areas, sugar mills crush the cane to make raw sugar. This raw sugar is then sent to other factories to be cleaned. In cooler areas, factories process the sugar beets directly into refined sugar. Both ways aim to create pure sucrose crystals.
Making pure white sugar involves a careful, step-by-step way it works. First, workers wash the raw sugar crystals. Next, they dissolve those crystals into a thick sugar syrup. This syrup is filtered to make it clean. Then, it is passed over carbon to remove any leftover color. Finally, the syrup is boiled under a vacuum. This last step makes the sucrose turn into clear, sweet crystals.
People have been studying this sugar for a long time. An English chemist named William Allen Miller named it "sucrose" in 1857. The name comes from the French word for sugar and a chemical ending. In 1860, a French chemist named Marcellin Berthelot gave it another name, saccharose. Scientists often use the short name "Suc" when they write about it.
It took many years for people to learn how to make it in a lab. Raymond Lemieux and George Huber finally succeeded in 1953.
Sugar comes in many different shapes for us to use. You might use large, sparkly grains called sanding sugar for treats. Most people use granulated sugar, which has grains about 0.5 mm across.
Some people like sugar cubes, which are small lumps made from syrup. There is also very fine powder called confectioner's sugar. If you want a darker color, you can use brown sugar. This type has more molasses left in it. In 2017, the whole world produced about 185 million tonnes of sugar.
Sucrose is a disaccharide, which is a type of sugar made of two smaller subunits. These two parts are glucose and fructose.
It is the primary component of white table sugar. Plants, algae, and cyanobacteria produce it naturally. They use sucrose to store energy gathered during photosynthesis. This sugar is found in many plant parts, including roots, fruits, and nectars. For example, pineapple and apricot are fruits where sucrose is the main sugar. In contrast, fruits like grapes and blueberries contain almost no sucrose.
In the natural world, sucrose acts as an energy storage molecule. The two subunits, glucose and fructose, are joined by a specific chemical bond. This is called a glycosidic linkage. Specifically, it is an ether bond between the first carbon of glucose and the second carbon of fructose. This unique connection is different from most other disaccharides. Because the bond forms at the reducing ends of both sugars, it prevents further bonding. This makes sucrose a non-reducing sugar. This chemical structure also prevents it from reacting spontaneously with other molecules in cells.
Humans extract sucrose from two main plant sources. Sugarcane is grown in tropical regions. Sugar beets are grown in temperate climates.
The refining process for both is quite detailed. In sugar mills, workers crush sugarcane to create raw sugar. This raw sugar is shipped to factories for further refining. In beet factories, the beets are processed directly into refined sugar. The refining steps involve washing raw crystals and dissolving them into a syrup. This syrup is filtered and passed over carbon to remove color. Finally, the syrup is boiled under a vacuum to create pure sucrose crystals. These crystals are clear, odorless, and sweet.
Scientists have a long history of studying this molecule. The term "sucrose" was coined in 1857 by the English chemist William Allen Miller. The name combines the French word for sugar with a chemical suffix. In 1860, the French chemist Marcellin Berthelot named it saccharose. While that name is now considered obsolete, it was once common. For a long time, scientists could not recreate sucrose in a laboratory. This changed in 1953 when Raymond Lemieux and George Huber succeeded. They synthesized sucrose from acetylated glucose and fructose.
Sucrose has several distinct physical forms used in cooking and industry. White refined sugar is nearly pure, often reaching a purity higher than 99.7 percent. It is sold in various grain sizes. Granulated sugar has a grain size of about 0.5 mm. Caster sugar is much finer at 0.35 mm and dissolves quickly. Powdered or confectioner's sugar is a very fine dust, measuring only 0.060 mm.
There is also coarse sanding sugar used for decoration. Brown sugar is different because it contains molasses. This gives it a darker color and a stronger flavor.
Some sugar is even made into cubes by mixing granulated sugar with syrup.
Chemical reactions can change how sucrose behaves. When sucrose is heated, it can undergo thermal degradation. This process is used in cooking to create caramel. If sucrose is mixed with potassium nitrate, it creates a fuel called rocket candy. This fuel is used to propel amateur rocket motors. Sucrose can also be broken down through a process called hydrolysis. This process splits the disaccharide back into glucose and fructose. This happens very slowly on its own, but enzymes like sucrase make it happen rapidly. In the human body, gastric acidity performs this hydrolysis during digestion.
Understanding sucrose involves precise scientific measurements. The industry uses degrees Brix, or °Bx, to measure sugar concentration. This measures the mass ratio of dissolved sugar to water. For instance, a 25 °Bx solution contains 25 grams of sucrose in 100 grams of liquid. Scientists also use polarimetry to check purity. This method measures how a sugar solution rotates plane-polarized light. The specific rotation for sucrose is +66.47 degrees. Globally, the scale of sugar production is massive. In 2017 alone, the world produced about 185 million tonnes of sugar.
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