Are disaccharides a type of carbohydrate?

1 Answer
Aug 24, 2015

Yes, disaccharides are a type of carbohydrate.

Explanation:

A carbohydrate or saccharide is a biological polyhydroxyaldehyde or ketone that usually has an empirical formula #"C"_m("H"_2"O")_n#.

The saccharides are divided into four chemical groups: monosaccharides, disaccharides, oligosaccharides, and polysaccharides.

The most well-known monosaccharide is glucose (#"C"_6"H"_12"O"_6#);

ibhumanbiochemistry.wikispaces.com

A disaccharide is the carbohydrate that is formed when two monosaccharides react and eliminate a molecule of water.

An example is the formation of sucrose, #"C"_12"H"_22"O"_11#, from glucose and fructose.

butane.chem.uiuc.edu

Two other common disaccharides are lactose and maltose.

chemwiki.ucdavis.edu