The liquid phase of the hydrolyzed product was obtained and
analyzed using HPLC to estimate its reducing sugar content. The
brown liquor comprised predominantly of xylose, glucose and
arabinose with traces of galactose and mannose, similar to other
works in acid catalyzed hydrolysis of water hyacinth (Girisuta
et al., 2008; Nigam, 2002). Table 3 shows the amount of reducing
sugar in individual monomer obtained after 60 min hydrolysis of
all samples. Higher cumulative amount of C5 sugar (pentoses) than
C6 sugar (hexoses) is closely related to higher hemicellulose content
compared to cellulose in water hyacinth biomass as listed in
Table 1.