Translations:Inulin/17/en

Biochemistry

Inulins are polymers composed mainly of fructose units (fructans), and typically have a terminal glucose. The fructose units in inulins are joined by a β(2→1) glycosidic bond. The molecule is almost exclusively linear, with only a few percent branching. In general, plant inulins contain between 2 and 70 fructose units or sometimes as high as 200, but molecules with less than 10 units are called fructo-oligosaccharides, the simplest being 1-kestose, which has two fructose units and one glucose unit. Bacterial inulin is more highly branched (more than 15% branching) and contains on the order of tens or hundreds of subunits.