Cost-effective colorimetric microtitre plate enzymatic assays for sucrose, glucose and fructose in sugarcane tissue extracts

Abstract

Quantification of sucrose, glucose and fructose is essential for developing a physiological understanding of growth and development of plant species. This is usually achieved by either HPLC or enzymatic assays for specific sugars. The need for reliable and cost-effective assays of large numbers of samples led us to compare microtitre plate-adapted enzymatic assays for sucrose, glucose and fructose with current HPLC protocols. The enzymatic assay techniques were modified without loss of precision or accuracy when compared to the original protocols. Application of HPLC and the modified enzymatic assay to a range of sugarcane stem extracts found no difference in assay sensitivity. The enzymatic assay had considerable advantages in terms of sample throughput and cost-effectiveness. © 1999 Society of Chemical Industry