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Suggested Citation:"The analytical methods employed." National Research Council. 1883. Investigation of the Scientific and Economic Relations of the Sorghum Sugar Industry: Being a Report Made in Response to a Request From the Hon. George B. Loring. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press.
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SORGHUM SUGAR INDUSTRY. 25 knowledge, leaves yet much to be accomplished in the same general direction. . To be of practical utility to the farmer, the work of the laboratory must be put to the test of experience, that the principles deduced from research in the small way and in a single or a limited number of seasons may be extended to meet various and possibly unfavorable conditions, and over a sufficient area and period of time to permit of a careful and thorough investigation under fairly average conditions. Among the more important points yet to be investigated may be mentioned the ascertainment by direct working tests on-a manufactur- ing, or at least a large experimental, scale of the relation existing be- tween the actual manufacturing yield and the proportion of available sugar, deduced from the analysis in accordance with the results of our previous experience with the juice of the sugar-cane and beet. This point is .essential to the realization of the greatest practical benefit from the work already accomplished in the course of this extended investigation. A large number 01 new sorts of sorghum from China, India, and Africa, have lately come to hand wholly unknown, and among them many important varieties never before on trial. The whole subject of the best methods of defecation, the use of lime, of sulphurous acid and the bisulphites, of strontia, the affusion of cold water, and other untried means, is in a state requiring further examina- tion and experiment before the important conditions on which much of the success of the sugar industry depends can be properly settled. The question of the use of fertilizers, what they should be, and how used, is in an unsatisfactory condition, as can be seen by reference to the results at the Department of Agriculture, those at the New Jersey Agricultural Experiment Station, and also those of Professor Swenson in 1882, reported in the Appendix. Here also, at the Department of Agriculture, alleged improvements in methods of culture and manufacture, which are liable not infre- quently to mislead the people, occasioning disappointment or loss, can be tested with an authority which is found only in the impartial con- clusions reached by official examination or experiment in competent hands. The Department of Agriculture, with its varied resources, scientific skill, mechanical appliances, and extended correspondence, coupled with the enormous circulation of its publications, can do this work as it cannot be done elsewhere. THE ANALYTICAL METHODS EMPLOYED. The Committee, after a careful examination of the analytical methods employed by the Chemical Division of the Department of Agriculture, find that they are entirely sufficient for the work to be done. The de- tails of the processes for the volumetric determination of sucrose and grape-sugar are fully exhibited on pages 9-11 of Special Report 33, and in the Annual Report of 1879, pages 66, 67.* These methods have been skillfully adapted to the character of the proximate constituents of the complex juices to be analyzed, and are among the best known to science. * The limits of error, as shown to the Committee from a considerable number of unpublished determinations, sustain the conclusion that the method employed for the estimation of cane and grape sugars was exceptionally accurate, and more sub- ject to a minus error of 0.2 per cent. on a 10 per cent. solution of pure sugar than to a plus error.

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Investigation of the Scientific and Economic Relations of the Sorghum Sugar Industry: Being a Report Made in Response to a Request From the Hon. George B. Loring Get This Book
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Sorghum is a plant that for many years has been used in the United States in an attempt to produce sugar. For over 25 years sorghum had been used to create syrup and it was believed that it sorghum would become a vital source of cane-sugar. Despite attempts, sorghum did not produce enough sugar to be of worth commercially. On January 30, 1882 the United States Commissioner of Agriculture of the Department of Agriculture, Hon. George B. Loring, requested that the National Academy of Sciences (NAS) review "the sorghum question"; that is the sugar-producing value of sorghum. Investigation of the Scientific and Economic Relations of the Sorghum Sugar Industry presents the NAS sorghum Committee's results following its investigation into the matter. The report includes the findings of the committee, the failures and success of producing sugar from sorghum, letters of transmittal, and more.

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