BACKGROUND INFORMATION FOR TEACHERS

I. In standard usage, carbohydrates are classified as:

 simple if they are sugars (monosaccharides and disaccharides)
 complex if they are polysaccharides (or starches)

II. Sugars that contain aldehyde groups that are capable of being oxidized to
carboxylic acids and cause the reduction of other substances are classified
as reducing sugars.

aldehyde                                                   carboxylate
                                                                                                     red precipitate

 Common test reagents are :

o Benedicts reagent (CuSO4 / citrate)
o Fehlings reagent (CuSO4 / tartrate)
 They are classified as reducing sugars since they reduce the Cu2+ to Cu+  which
forms as a red precipitate, copper (I) oxide.
 In order for oxidation to occur, the cyclic form must first ring-open to give
the reactive aldehyde.
 Sugars exist in solution as an equilibrium mixture of open-chain and closed-ring
(or cyclic) structures.

Reducing Sugars Non-reducing Sugars

Have a free aldehyde (-CHO) or ketone (-CO) These do not have these free aldehyde
group or ketone groups
Have the capacity reduce Cu+2 ions of These do not reduce Cu (II) ions of
Benedict’s solution to Cu+ ions Benedict’s solution to Cu (I)
Examples: all common monosaccharides Sucrose
(glucose, fructose) and disaccharides
(maltose, lactose)

2. FROM: Why is sucrose not a reducing sugar?

https://chemstory.wordpress.com/2013/06/06/why-is-sucrose-not-a-reducing-sugar/

A reducing sugar is any sugar that has an aldehyde group, or can form one.

a) an aldehyde group is needed, which must be present on either the 1st or the last
carbon.
For sugars like maltose, glucose or lactose to be reducing sugars when they
don’t appear to have an aldehyde group, the next point to note is 
b) the ring structure can be broken to reform an aldehyde on the 1st carbon just like
the reversible reaction shown here for glucose.
 BACKGROUND INFORMATION FOR TEACHERS

 After that, look closely at Maltose and Lactose to examine if the 1st carbon atom
can split with the oxygen in the ring structure to form back an aldehyde on itself just as
glucose could in the picture above. 

For Maltose, the 1st carbon for the glucose residue on the right is free to reform into an
aldehyde! Check that it is the same for Lactose below.
 BACKGROUND INFORMATION FOR TEACHERS

 And last, examine this picture of sucrose

 
Note that to form an aldehyde, the OH on the 1st carbon must give its H to the O in the
ring… but there is no OH group on any of the 1st carbons in sucrose!

So sucrose is a non-reducing sugar.