TITLE:
Comparison of Stem Damage and Carbohydrate Composition in the Stem Juice between Sugarcane and Sweet Sorghum Harvested before and after Late Fall Frost
AUTHORS:
Ming Li Wang, Marsha Cole, Brandon Tonnis, David Pinnow, Zhanguo Xin, Jerry Davis, Yen-Con Hung, Jianming Yu, Gary A. Pederson, Gillian Eggleston
KEYWORDS:
Sweet Sorghum, Sugarcane, Late Fall Frost, Stem Damage, Juice Quality, Carbohydrate Composition, Hydraulic Press (HP), High Performance Liquid Chromatography (HPLC), Complementary Feedstocks, Sustainable Bioenergy Production
JOURNAL NAME:
Journal of Sustainable Bioenergy Systems,
Vol.4 No.3,
September
1,
2014
ABSTRACT: A late fall frost
may significantly affect sugar crops’ stem sugar composition, yield and juice
quality for biofuel and bioproduct manufacture. Research on the effects of late
fall frost in sugarcane is well documented, but information is lacking for
sweet sorghum. Three and six commercial cultivars of sugarcane and sweet
sorghum, respectively, were selected and evaluated for exposure to a late fall
frost (-2.8°C) in Griffin, Georgia, USA. Under the same controlled
environmental conditions in a screen house, the late fall frost induced more damage
to sugarcane than sweet sorghum stems. The frost caused damage to sugarcane
tissue and for juice to exude from stems, whereas similar behavior was not
observed for sweet sorghum. In both sugarcane and sweet sorghum, the
glucose/fructose ratio was significantly reduced, but this change may not be
totally directly related to the frost effect. Overall, these initial results
suggest that sweet sorghum may have a better tolerance to fall frost than
sugarcane. Two sweet sorghum cultivars, Grassl and M81E, responded well to the
late fall frost, and they can possibly be used as feedstocks for
biofuel/bioproduct manufacture in areas susceptible to frosts including northern
regions of the Southeastern US.