What are polysaccarhides?

Answer 1

The simplest carbohydrate molecule is a sugar. For example, glucose. A single glucose (or any other simple sugar) is called a monosaccharide. A string of two joined sugar molecules (say 2 joined glucoses) forms a disaccharide. Many thousands of sugar molecules joined into a very long string is what a polysaccharide is. Starch is a plant-stored polysaccharide and glycogen is an animal-stored polysaccharide. These are examples of very long strings of alpha glucose molecules. A long string of beta glucoses forms the polysaccharide called cellulose.