High fructose corn syrup production

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Nutrition, Health & Wellness

High fructose corn syrup production In 1957, HFCS (High-fructose corn syrup) was first introduced by Earl R. Kooi and Richard O. Marshall. However they could not achieve successful viable large scale production.
In 1965-1970, at Agency of Industrial Science and Technology of Ministry of International Trade and Industry of Japan, Dr. Y. Takasaki created the commercial production process for high-fructose corn syrup.

High fructose corn syrup production process

Corn is milled to get cornstarch. Then the cornstarch is treated with enzyme alpha-amylase to produce oligosaccharides ( with short chains of sugar). Oligosaccharides are broken down into glucose by the enzyme glucoamylase produced by the Aspergillus fungus in the fermentation vessel.

Another enzyme, xylose isomerase (also called aka glucose isomerase) converts glucose into a mixture of fructose and glucose at 42% and 50% respectively. The enzymes alpha-amylase and glucoamylase are inexpensive and are added to the corn slurry directly during production. However the enzyme xylose isomerase being expensive is packed in columns and sugar slurry is passed over it for the enzymatic reaction.

The xylose isomerase is reused repeatedly till its activity is lost. HFCS 42 produced thus is purified and enriched by liquid chromatography step to obtain HFCS 90 with 90% fructose content. By adding HFCS $2 and HFCS 90 in appropriate ratios High-fructose corn syrup 55 in formulated.