ELI5: Explain Like I'm 5

Monosaccharides

Hello there! Do you know what sugar is? Yeah, the tasty, sweet stuff we put in our cookies and cakes. Well, sugar is actually made up of tiny, tiny building blocks called monosaccharides (pronounced: mono-sack-uh-rides).

Monosaccharides are like building blocks because they help make up more complex sugars, like glucose and fructose. These complex sugars are important for our bodies because they give us energy to run, jump, and play.

Imagine if you were building a tower out of blocks. The blocks you use are like monosaccharides. The more monosaccharides you have, the bigger and stronger the tower can be.

There are different kinds of monosaccharides, like glucose, fructose, and galactose. They look different but they all taste sweet! Just like how yellow blocks can look different from red blocks but they're all still blocks.

So, in summary, monosaccharides are tiny building blocks that make up sugars, like glucose and fructose, which give us energy to keep us healthy and active.
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