Carbohydrates Carbohydrates form a large group of chemical compounds that are, or are composed of, monosaccharides or their closely related derivatives, such as sugar alcohols. Disaccharides contain two, oligosaccharides few and polysaccharides lots of monosaccharide units. Although the definition of oligo- and polysaccharides is somewhat vague, plant polysaccharides with their degree of polymersation (DP) in
