°WK or degrees Windisch-Kolbach is a unit for measuring the
diastatic power of
malt
Malt is any cereal grain that has been made to germinate by soaking in water and then stopped from germinating further by drying with hot air, a process known as "malting".
Malted grain is used to make beer, whisky, malted milk, malt vinegar, ...
, named after the German brewer
Wilhelm Windisch and the Luxembourg brewer
Paul Kolbach. It is a common unit in
beer brewing (especially in
Europe
Europe is a continent located entirely in the Northern Hemisphere and mostly in the Eastern Hemisphere. It is bordered by the Arctic Ocean to the north, the Atlantic Ocean to the west, the Mediterranean Sea to the south, and Asia to the east ...
) that measures the ability of enzymes in malt to reduce starch to sugar (
maltose
}
Maltose ( or ), also known as maltobiose or malt sugar, is a disaccharide formed from two units of glucose joined with an α(1→4) bond. In the isomer isomaltose, the two glucose molecules are joined with an α(1→6) bond. Maltose is the tw ...
). It is defined as the amount of maltose formed by 100 g of malt in 30 min at 20 °C.
Degrees Lintner is a unit used in the
United States
The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...
for the same purpose. The conversion is as follows:
.
334 °WK = 3.014×10
−7 Katal
The katal (symbol: kat) is a unit of the International System of Units (SI) used for quantifying the catalytic activity of enzymes (that is, measuring the enzymatic activity level in enzyme catalysis) and other catalysts. One katal is that ...
References
*W. Diemair: ''Analytik der Lebensmittel Nachweis und Bestimmung von Lebensmittel-Inhaltsstoffen'', Springer Verlag, Berlin/Heidelberg/New York 1967, S. 255–256.
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Units of measurement
Brewing