[jena]

Hi,

In order to reduce a sugar to a alcohol, would use an reductase to do this?

Thank You


EDIT: spelling mistake - enyme -> enzyme

[Mitch]

I thought sugars were already alcohols?

[Yggdrasil]

Yes, sugars are polyhydroxylated, so they can definitely be considered alcohols already.  However, in biochemistry a sugar alcohol is a sugar in which the aldehyde or ketone function in the sugar has been reduced to an alcohol.

Yes, an oxidoreductase would be the class of enzyme to catalyze such a reaction.

[constant thinker]

I thought the only thing that made a sugar a sugar was the double bond O on one of the carbons. The rest didn't matter. With respect to the other functional groups of organic chemistry of course.

If you break the double bond O and take that bonding spot that was just freed and added a H thento it then you have an alcohol.

[billnotgatez]

constant thinker -
You might want to read these 2 sites before discussing sugar

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glucose
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sucrose

[constant thinker]

Sorry...  

..but is it not the double bonded O that makes a sugar a sugar. This is in respect to things like the COOH and other functional groups.