Glucose

Glucose is one of the most abundant and important monosaccharides, occurring in nature both in its free form (as in fruit and honey) and combined into larger carbohydrates such as sucrose, starch and cellulose. On an industrial/laboratory scale, free glucose is most conveniently obtained by acid-catalysed hydrolysis of either of these two combined sources -- sucrose or starch -- breaking their glycosidic linkages back down to free monosaccharide units. The two preparation routes, from sucrose and from starch, are detailed in turn in the two lettered sub-sections below; both use dilute mineral acid as catalyst, but differ in the exact …