An Alternative Procedure for Carbohydrate Analysis of Bananas: Cheaper and Easier

A modification of an experiment previously developed for nutritional or introductory biochemistry courses quantifying the carbohydrate content of ripening banana is reported. Earlier investigations employed either chromatography or a colorimetric assay followed by spectroscopy to measure the increasing concentration of glucose as the banana ripens and included specialized and expensive biochemical equipment such as a refrigerated centrifuge and glass homogenizers. In this article the use of commercially available glucose test strips for home diabetic care is described as a new approach for determining the glucose concentrations in a ripening banana and common laboratory equipment has replaced a few specialized items.