Keywords
Fructose, Glucose, Honey, HPLC, RI detector, Sugar
Abstract
Honey, a complex natural foodstuff is used for various purposes without any processing. Honey has been used in medicine as well as raw food since ancient times. Essentially, it is a blend of sugars, especially fructose and glucose. Honey which is available in the commercial market may not be pure and could be adulterated with sugar. The objective of the study is to determine the major sugar composition in honey and to assess its freshness. A total of twenty five samples were collected from local markets and analyzed for
the content of glucose and fructose. Total sugar content in terms of glucose and fructose was in the range of 51 to 69 %. The ratio of
fructose to glucose in these honey samples was in the range of 1.0 to 1.3 which is also an important parameter to assess the purity of honey. Out of twenty five samples, only one sample has fructose to glucose ratio below 1.0 indicating lesser chances for honey to
crystallize on storage. A convention for the assurance of two important monosaccharide sugars (fructose and glucose) in honey is set up within the current study by utilizing ordinary stage amino column (NH2)partition liquid chromatography using a Refractive Index detector.