Carbohydrates

Carbohydrates provide short term energy - which means when you eat them, you can get useable ATP in a matter of minutes, hours or a day or two.

• Monomers - Monosaccharides - single sugar molecules

  • Glucose, Fructose, Galactose (most carb names end in -ose)

• Disaccharides - two monosaccharides linked together

  • Sucrose = Glucose + Fructose​

  • Maltose = Glucose + Glucose

  • Lactose = Glucose + Galactose

• Polysaccharides - long chains of glucose​

  • Starch - used to store glucose in plants​

  • Glycogen - used to store glucose in animals

  • Cellulose - used to build cell walls in plants; indigestible to most animals (dietary fiber)

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Nutrition

• Carbohydrates provide 4 calories of energy per gram.  

• The digestive system will break down all carbs into monosaccharides to be absorbed in the blood and taken to the liver.

• The liver can join glucose molecules together to make glycogen when there is too much sugar

• The liver can break glycogen apart to release glucose if there is not enough sugar in the blood.

• If glycogen remains unused, the liver converts excess sugar into fat.