Development Of A New Industrial Method To Measure Starch In Sugar Products

An easy, rapid, and inexpensive method was developed to measure total, soluble, and insoluble starch in products at the factory and refinery, using microwave-assisted neutralization chemistry. The method was optimized using the previously developed USDA Starch Research method as a reference. Optimal acid and base combinations and concentrations plus microwave time and power were determined to completely solubilize an insoluble corn starch reference. The final method, e.g. Cole Industrial Starch Method, solubilizes up to 4,000 ppm insoluble starch in 2 min, has acceptable precision (7% CV, coefficient of variation), accuracy (294%), uses a corn starch reference, and incorporates a color blank to remove contribution from natural colorants found in industrial samples. It was also validated according to ICUMSA's single laboratory validation method on both simulated (5% CV) and factory products, i.e., sugarcane crusher juice (8% CV), clarified juice (12% CV), masseculte (2% CV), molasses (4% CV), syrup (2% CV), and eight raw sugars (8% CV). The Cole Industrial Starch Method and USDA Starch Research methods were very similar (R-2 = 0.9994) with an overall mean difference of only similar to 6.5%.