Can sugar evaporate?

Question

Let's say it's sugar water, can you evaporate it back?

Answer 1

no, because sugar burns or changes into another substance in high temperature

Answer 2

Beginning in the late 18th century, sugar production became increasingly mechanized. The steam engine first powered a sugar mill in Jamaica in 1768, and soon thereafter, steam replaced direct firing as the source of process heat.

In 1813, the British chemist Edward Charles Howard invented a sugar refining method which involved boiling the cane juice not in an open kettle, but in a closed vessel heated by steam and held under partial vacuum. At reduced pressure, water boils at a lower temperature, and this development both saved fuel and reduced the amount of sugar lost through caramelization. Further gains in fuel efficiency were achieved through the multiple-effect evaporator, designed by the African-American engineer Norbert Rillieux perhaps as early as the 1820s, although the first working model was not built until 1845. This system consisted of a series of vacuum pans, each held at a lower pressure than the previous. The vapors from each pan were used to heat the next, and little heat wasted. Today, multiple-effect evaporators are employed widely in many industries for evaporating water.

The process of separating the sugar from the molasses also received mechanical attention: David Weston first applied the centrifuge to this task in Hawaii in 1852.

Answer 3

"Yes, the water can evaporate, leaving the solid sugar."

Sugar molecules at SATP (standard ambient temperature & pressure; 25 degrees centigrade & 100kPa) collect into solids in the absence of water.

The sugar molecules themselves only evaporate to a negligible amount (or else they would be classified as a gas at SATP instead of a solid).

But you can evaporate the water from a sugar solution to re-obtain your dry solid crystalline sugar, though it may be shaped differently. Theoretically, you can recrystallize any solid back. The process may just take a bit of time, especially if the solution is dilute. If you heat it too much when trying to speed up the process, you may decompose the sugar (so it's not sugar anymore).

http://www.cheminst.ca/ncw/crystal/xl.html and http://www.chemistry.co.nz/crystals_forming.htm have some good information on how recrystallization happens.

Did you know that table sugar from the store comes from evaporated sugar cane (a plant) syrup? See http://www.tateandlyle.com/TateAndLyle/our_business/about_our_processes/about_refining/default.htm .

And our raw table salt is recrystallized ("evaporated") from the sea? The poor people that do this go blind from the bright shininess & corossiveness of the salt.

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Answer 4

You can evaporate the water out of the sugar water and if you continue heating the sugar you can break it into carbon and water and evaporate that water. Sugar is C6H12O6 and water is H2O.

Answer 5

the water in the sugar water will slowly evaporate, leaving the sugar crystals in the container

You can do this experiment at home.

By the way, evaporation is the process where liquid becomes gas. The opposite process, where gas become liquid, we call it 'condensation'

Answer 6

Hmm...It will be the same for salt.Okay.Here is how it goes: When you mix sugar(or salt) with watr,it becomes a sugar(salt)solution.When it evaporates,only the water(and not the sugar)evaporates.Just imagine if the sea water(together with salt)evaporates.You will receive "acid" rain.Salt will irritate sensitive skin n many more...

Answer 7

no
you can eveporate the water and you'll be left with sugar

Answer 8

Lets say I'm a bit thick - but don't you mean "condense" it back?