D.A. Cooke and R.K. Scott Sugar beet is one of just two crops (the other being sugar cane) which constitute the only important sources of sucrose - a product with sweeten- ing and preserving properties that make it a major component of, or additive to, a vast range of foods, beverages and pharmaceuticals. Sugar, as sucrose is almost invariably called, has been a valued compo- nent of the human diet for thousands of years. For the great majority of that time the only source of pure sucrose was the sugar-cane plant, varieties of which are all species or hybrids within the genus Saccharum. The...