Maturation curves of sweet sorghum genotypes

Sweet sorghum [Sorghum bicolor (L.) Moench] stands out as a complementary crop to sugarcane Saccharum spp. for the production of ethanol, since it has juicy stems with directly fermentable sugars. Due to this fact, there is a need for the analysis of sweet sorghum properties in order to meet the agro-industry demand. This work aimed to develop and study the maturation curves of seven sweet sorghum cultivars in ten harvest dates. The results showed a significant difference between cultivars and harvest dates for all parameters analysed (p≤0.01). Regarding the sugar content, the cultivars BRS508, XBWS80147 and CMSX629 showed the highest means for the total reducing sugars (TRS) and recoverable sugar (RS). In the production of ethanol per tonne of biomass (EP), the cultivars BRS508 and CMSX629 presented the best results.