''Saccharum officinarum'' is a large, strong-growing species of

grass Poaceae () or Gramineae () is a large and nearly ubiquitous family of monocotyledonous flowering plants commonly known as grasses. It includes the cereal grasses, bamboos and the grasses of natural grassland and species cultivated in lawns a ...

in the genus '' Saccharum''. Its stout stalks are rich in

sucrose Sucrose, a disaccharide, is a sugar composed of glucose and fructose subunits. It is produced naturally in plants and is the main constituent of white sugar. It has the molecular formula . For human consumption, sucrose is extracted and refine ...

, a simple

sugar Sugar is the generic name for sweet-tasting, soluble carbohydrates, many of which are used in food. Simple sugars, also called monosaccharides, include glucose, fructose, and galactose. Compound sugars, also called disaccharides or do ...

which accumulates in the stalk internodes. It originated in

New Guinea New Guinea (; Hiri Motu: ''Niu Gini''; id, Papua, or , historically ) is the world's second-largest island with an area of . Located in Oceania in the southwestern Pacific Ocean, the island is separated from Australia by the wide Torres ...

, and is now cultivated in tropical and subtropical countries worldwide for the production of

ethanol Ethanol (abbr. EtOH; also called ethyl alcohol, grain alcohol, drinking alcohol, or simply alcohol) is an organic compound. It is an alcohol with the chemical formula . Its formula can be also written as or (an ethyl group linked to a ...

and other products. ''Saccharum officinarum'' is one of the most productive and most intensively cultivated kinds of

sugarcane Sugarcane or sugar cane is a species of (often hybrid) tall, perennial grass (in the genus '' Saccharum'', tribe Andropogoneae) that is used for sugar production. The plants are 2–6 m (6–20 ft) tall with stout, jointed, fibrous stalk ...

. It can interbreed with other sugarcane species, such as '' Saccharum sinense'' and '' Saccharum barberi''. The major commercial

cultivar A cultivar is a type of cultivated plant that people have selected for desired traits and when propagated retain those traits. Methods used to propagate cultivars include: division, root and stem cuttings, offsets, grafting, tissue culture ...

s are complex hybrids. About 70% of the sugar produced worldwide comes from ''S. officinarum'' and hybrids using this species.

Description

''Saccharum officinarum'', a

perennial A perennial plant or simply perennial is a plant that lives more than two years. The term ('' per-'' + '' -ennial'', "through the years") is often used to differentiate a plant from shorter-lived annuals and biennials. The term is also widel ...

plant, grows in clumps consisting of a number of strong unbranched stems. A network of

rhizome In botany and dendrology, a rhizome (; , ) is a modified subterranean plant stem that sends out roots and shoots from its nodes. Rhizomes are also called creeping rootstalks or just rootstalks. Rhizomes develop from axillary buds and grow ...

s forms under the soil which sends up secondary shoots near the parent plant. The stems vary in colour, being green, pinkish, or purple and can reach in height. They are jointed, nodes being present at the bases of the alternate

leaves A leaf ( : leaves) is any of the principal appendages of a vascular plant stem, usually borne laterally aboveground and specialized for photosynthesis. Leaves are collectively called foliage, as in "autumn foliage", while the leaves, st ...

. The internodes contain a fibrous white pith immersed in sugary sap. The elongated, linear, green leaves have thick midribs and saw-toothed edges and grow to a length of about and width of . The terminal inflorescence is a

panicle A panicle is a much-branched inflorescence. (softcover ). Some authors distinguish it from a compound spike inflorescence, by requiring that the flowers (and fruit) be pedicellate (having a single stem per flower). The branches of a panicle are of ...

up to long, a pinkish plume that is broadest at the base and tapering towards the top. The

spikelet A spikelet, in botany, describes the typical arrangement of the flowers of grasses, sedges and some other Monocots. Each spikelet has one or more florets. The spikelets are further grouped into panicles or spikes. The part of the spikelet that ...

s are borne on side branches and are about long and are concealed in tufts of long, silky hair. The fruits are dry and each one contains a single seed. Sugarcane harvest typically occurs before the plants flower, as the flowering process causes a reduction in sugar content.

Taxonomy

''Saccharum officinarum'' was first domesticated in

and the islands east of the

Wallace Line The Wallace Line or Wallace's Line is a faunal boundary line drawn in 1859 by the British naturalist Alfred Russel Wallace and named by English biologist Thomas Henry Huxley that separates the biogeographical realms of Asia and Wallacea, a trans ...

Papuans The indigenous peoples of West Papua in Indonesia and Papua New Guinea, commonly called Papuans, are Melanesians. There is genetic evidence for two major historical lineages in New Guinea and neighboring islands: a first wave from the Malay Arch ...

, where it is the modern center of diversity. Beginning at around 6,000 BP it was

selectively bred Selective breeding (also called artificial selection) is the process by which humans use animal breeding and plant breeding to selectively develop particular phenotypic traits (characteristics) by choosing which typically animal or plant ma ...

from the native '' Saccharum robustum''. From New Guinea it spread westwards to

Island Southeast Asia Maritime Southeast Asia comprises the countries of Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, and East Timor. Maritime Southeast Asia is sometimes also referred to as Island Southeast Asia, Insular Southeast Asia or Oceanic Sout ...

after contact with

Austronesians The Austronesian peoples, sometimes referred to as Austronesian-speaking peoples, are a large group of peoples in Taiwan, Maritime Southeast Asia, Micronesia, coastal New Guinea, Island Melanesia, Polynesia, and Madagascar that speak Au ...

, where it hybridized with '' S. spontaneum''. The Hawaiian word for this species is kō.

Uses

Portions of the stem of this and several other species of sugarcane have been used from ancient times for chewing to extract the sweet juice. It was cultivated in New Guinea about 8,000 years ago for this purpose. Extraction of the juice and boiling to concentrate it was probably first done in India more than 2,000 years ago. ''Saccharum officinarum'' and its hybrids are grown for the production of sugar, ethanol, and other industrial uses in tropical and subtropical regions around the world. The stems and the

byproduct A by-product or byproduct is a secondary product derived from a production process, manufacturing process or chemical reaction; it is not the primary product or service being produced. A by-product can be useful and marketable or it can be consid ...

s of the sugar industry are used for feeding to

livestock Livestock are the domesticated animals raised in an agricultural setting to provide labor and produce diversified products for consumption such as meat, eggs, milk, fur, leather, and wool. The term is sometimes used to refer solely to ani ...

. Pigs fed on sugarcane juice and a soy-based

protein supplement A protein supplement may be a dietary supplement or a bodybuilding supplement, and may take the form of a protein bar. Effects Muscle building as GURJAR In untrained individuals, changes in lean body mass and muscle strength during the initial ...

produced stronger piglets that grew faster than those on a more conventional diet. As its specific name (''officinarum'', "of dispensaries") implies, it is also used in traditional medicine both internally and externally.

References

External links

* * {{Authority control officinarum Flora of New Guinea Crops originating from Asia Flora of the Dominican Republic Plants described in 1753 Taxa named by Carl Linnaeus Flora without expected TNC conservation status

Description

Taxonomy

Uses

See also

References

External links