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Plants synthesize starch in two types of tissues. The first type is storage tissues, for example, cereal endosperm, and storage roots and stems such as cassava and potato. The second type is green tissue, for example, leaves, where many plant species synthesize transitory starch on a daily basis.
Starch production is an isolation of starch from plant sources. It takes place in starch plants. Starch industry is a part of food processing which is using starch as a starting material for production of starch derivatives, hydrolysates, dextrins. [1] At first, the raw material for the preparation of the starch was wheat.
Plants absorb light primarily using the pigment chlorophyll. The green part of the light spectrum is not absorbed but is reflected, which is the reason that most plants have a green color. Besides chlorophyll, plants also use pigments such as carotenes and xanthophylls. [25]
To generate energy, the plant hydrolyzes the starch, releasing the glucose subunits. Humans and other animals that eat plant foods also use amylase, an enzyme that assists in breaking down amylopectin, to initiate the hydrolysis of starch. [3] Starch is made of about 70–80% amylopectin by weight, though it varies depending on the source.
Most crop plants store ~0.25% to 0.5% of the sunlight in the product (corn kernels, potato starch, etc.). Photosynthesis increases linearly with light intensity at low intensity, but at higher intensity this is no longer the case (see Photosynthesis-irradiance curve ).
Amylose is important in plant energy storage. It is less readily digested than amylopectin; however, because of its helical structure, it takes up less space than amylopectin. As a result, it is the preferred starch for storage in plants. It makes up about 30% of the stored starch in plants, though the percentage varies by species and variety. [13]
Amylolytic process or amylolysis is the conversion of starch into sugar by the action of acids or enzymes such as amylase. [1]Starch begins to pile up inside the leaves of plants during times of light when starch is able to be produced by photosynthetic processes.
Starch synthesis and storage also takes place in chloroplasts, a type of pigmented plastid involved in photosynthesis. [1] Amyloplasts and chloroplasts are closely related, and amyloplasts can turn into chloroplasts; this is for instance observed when potato tubers are exposed to light and turn green.