Sugar

:This article deals with sugar as food and as an important, widely traded commodity. The word also has other uses; see sugar (disambiguation).

Related Topics:
Food - Commodity - Sugar (disambiguation)

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A sugar is a carbohydrate which contains the functional group (CH2O)n). Sugars are sweet to taste and are used in food and drink as a source of sweetness and energy making them important in biochemistry. In general use, "sugar" is taken to mean sucrose, also called "table sugar", or saccharose, a disaccharide which is a white crystalline solid. It is the most commonly used sugar for altering the flavor and properties (such as "mouthfeel", preservation, and texture) of beverages and food. Table sugar is commercially extracted from either sugar cane or sugar beet.

Related Topics:
Carbohydrate - Functional group - Food - Drink - Biochemistry - Sucrose - Disaccharide - Crystal - Solid - Flavor - Beverage - Sugar cane - Sugar beet

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The "simple" sugars, or monosaccharides, such as glucose (which is produced from sucrose by enzymes or acid hydrolysis), are a store of energy which is used by biological cells.

Related Topics:
Glucose - Enzyme - Energy - Biological - Cell

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For information on the other sugars, see monosaccharide and disaccharide.

Related Topics:
Monosaccharide - Disaccharide

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In precise culinary terms, sugar is a type of food associated with one of the primary taste sensations, that of sweetness.

Related Topics:
Food - Primary taste

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In the Southern United States and in some regions of Europe, sugar or to have the sugar is slang for diabetes mellitus, the medical condition in which sugar metabolism is disrupted.

Related Topics:
United States - Europe - Slang - Diabetes mellitus - Metabolism

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