Role in human nutrition

The total caloric, or energy, requirement for an individual depends on age, occupation, and other factors but generally ranges between 2,000 and 4,000 calories per 24-hour period (one calorie, as this term is used in nutrition, is the amount of heat necessary to raise the temperature of 1,000 grams of water from 15 to 16 °C [59 to 61 °F]; in other contexts this amount of heat is called the kilocalorie). Carbohydrate that can be used by humans produces four calories per gram as opposed to nine calories per gram of fat and four per gram of protein. In areas of the world where nutrition is marginal, a high proportion (approximately one to two pounds) of an individual’s daily energy requirement may be supplied by carbohydrate, with most of the remainder coming from a variety of fat sources.

Although carbohydrates may compose as much as 80 percent of the total caloric intake in the human diet, for a given diet, the proportion of starch to total carbohydrate is quite variable, depending upon the prevailing customs. In East Asia and in areas of Africa, for example, where rice or tubers such as manioc provide a major food source, starch may account for as much as 80 percent of the total carbohydrate intake. In a typical Western diet, 33 to 50 percent of the caloric intake is in the form of carbohydrate. Approximately half (i.e., 17 to 25 percent) is represented by starch; another third by table sugar (sucrose) and milk sugar (lactose); and smaller percentages by monosaccharides such as glucose and fructose, which are common in fruits, honey, syrups, and certain vegetables such as artichokes, onions, and sugar beets. The small remainder consists of bulk, or indigestible carbohydrate, which comprises primarily the cellulosic outer covering of seeds and the stalks and leaves of vegetables. (See also nutrition.)

Role in energy storage

Starches, the major plant-energy-reserve polysaccharides used by humans, are stored in plants in the form of nearly spherical granules that vary in diameter from about three to 100 micrometres (about 0.0001 to 0.004 inch). Most plant starches consist of a mixture of two components: amylose and amylopectin. The glucose molecules composing amylose have a straight-chain, or linear, structure. Amylopectin has a branched-chain structure and is a somewhat more compact molecule. Several thousand glucose units may be present in a single starch molecule. (In the diagram, each small circle represents one glucose molecule.)

In addition to granules, many plants have large numbers of specialized cells, called parenchymatous cells, the principal function of which is the storage of starch; examples of plants with these cells include root vegetables and tubers. The starch content of plants varies considerably; the highest concentrations are found in seeds and in cereal grains, which contain up to 80 percent of their total carbohydrate as starch. The amylose and amylopectin components of starch occur in variable proportions; most plant species store approximately 25 percent of their starch as amylose and 75 percent as amylopectin. This proportion can be altered, however, by selective-breeding techniques, and some varieties of corn have been developed that produce up to 70 percent of their starch as amylose, which is more easily digested by humans than is amylopectin.

In addition to the starches, some plants (e.g., the Jerusalem artichoke and the leaves of certain grasses, particularly rye grass) form storage polysaccharides composed of fructose units rather than glucose. Although the fructose polysaccharides can be broken down and used to prepare syrups, they cannot be digested by higher animals.

Starches are not formed by animals; instead, they form a closely related polysaccharide, glycogen. Virtually all vertebrate and invertebrate animal cells, as well as those of numerous fungi and protozoans, contain some glycogen; particularly high concentrations of this substance are found in the liver and muscle cells of higher animals. The overall structure of glycogen, which is a highly branched molecule consisting of glucose units, has a superficial resemblance to that of the amylopectin component of starch, although the structural details of glycogen are significantly different. Under conditions of stress or muscular activity in animals, glycogen is rapidly broken down to glucose, which is subsequently used as an energy source. In this manner, glycogen acts as an immediate carbohydrate reserve. Furthermore, the amount of glycogen present at any given time, especially in the liver, directly reflects an animal’s nutritional state. When adequate food supplies are available, both glycogen and fat reserves of the body increase, but when food supplies decrease or when the food intake falls below the minimum energy requirements, the glycogen reserves are depleted quite rapidly, while those of fat are used at a slower rate.

Role in plant and animal structure

Whereas starches and glycogen represent the major reserve polysaccharides of living things, most of the carbohydrate found in nature occurs as structural components in the cell walls of plants. Carbohydrates in plant cell walls generally consist of several distinct layers, one of which contains a higher concentration of cellulose than the others. The physical and chemical properties of cellulose are strikingly different from those of the amylose component of starch.

In most plants, the cell wall is about 0.5 micrometre thick and contains a mixture of cellulose, pentose-containing polysaccharides (pentosans), and an inert (chemically unreactive) plastic-like material called lignin. The amounts of cellulose and pentosan may vary; most plants contain between 40 and 60 percent cellulose, although higher amounts are present in the cotton fibre.

Polysaccharides also function as major structural components in animals. Chitin, which is similar to cellulose, is found in insects and other arthropods. Other complex polysaccharides predominate in the structural tissues of higher animals.