Question

6. Susan slowly chewed a small spoonful of rice for about five minutes. The rice began to taste sweet as she chewed it. (Hint: Sugars such as glucose taste sweet but starches do not.) (a) Formulate a hypothesis to explain this description. (b) Predict if steamed eggs would taste as sweet as rice when the eggs are chewed. Explain your prediction.​

Answer 1

Susan's rice tasted sweet because starch in rice is broken down into sugar by the enzyme amylase. Steamed eggs would not taste as sweet because they do not contain starch.

Step-by-step explanation:

Susan's description can be explained by the process of starch digestion. Starch is a complex carbohydrate made up of long chains of glucose molecules. When Susan chewed the rice, her saliva containing the enzyme amylase began to break down the starch into smaller sugar molecules. These sugar molecules, including glucose, can stimulate the sweet taste buds on the tongue, hence making the rice taste sweet.

Based on this process, it can be predicted that steamed eggs would not taste as sweet as rice when chewed. This is because eggs do not contain starch, so there is no amylase enzyme present to break down starch into sugar. Therefore, the eggs would not produce the same sweet taste as rice.