STUDIES ON THE FREE SUGARS OF THE BARLEY GRAIN: IV. LOW-MOLECULAR FRUCTOSANS

Abstract

Ungerminated barley yields a series of fructose-containing oligosaccharides which can be separated, on charcoal-kieselguhr columns and by paper chromatography, into at least six separate fractions. The simplest member of the fructosan series is glucodifructose, with smaller quantities of glucotrifructose, glucotetra-fructose and glucopentafructose also present; the more complex fructosan material, ranging up to glucodecafructose, has not as yet been fractionated into discrete compounds. In addition to easily-hydrolysable fructosan, one sample of Ymer barley contained traces of an oligosaccharide, in the tetrasaccharide region of the chromatogram, which was only partially hydrolysed by invertase or by acetic acid.