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I heard that to measure a banana's ripeness I would have to compare its sugar to starch ratio, but what would be the best method of doing that? I am not sure if refractometers measure starch as well, since it is a type of carbohydrate.

Paulus Michael Davinson Cahyad
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Iodine can be used reliably to measure starch content in bananas and it is correlated with sugar (soluble solids).

Summary. A starch staining technique using pictures to rate starch disappearance has been developed to determine banana pulp maturity. The disappearance of starch from the pulp shows linear correlation with peel color (r = 0.76) and soluble solids content (r = 0.81). Pulp pH shows a poor correlation with starch disappearance (r = 0.38). Staining banana pulp starch with an iodine solution is a quick and easy method for estimation of pulp maturity.

http://horttech.ashspublications.org/content/3/3/338.full.pdf

Kevin Nowaczyk
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    Please paste the text that relates to this question in your answer. Sometimes links die and then the answer would be less useful. By citing the publication and author plus the important part of the text we can rescue the answer should this link cease to work. – Catija Aug 23 '17 at 01:28