Biomass Catalysis

The Catalysis for Biomass Conversion section of the journal Catalysts publishes original and high-quality research Communications, Articles, and Review articles in the areas of catalytic conversion of biomass and its derivatives to (gas, liquid, or solid) chemicals and fuels and materials.

The focus of the section is on the understanding of catalytic processes for biomass conversion at the micro-, meso-, and macro scale from: 1) the rational design and synthesis of advanced catalysts, to 2) the characterization of their structures and active sites, to 3) the understanding of the catalytic mechanism, and 4) resulting catalytic processes and technologies.

All manuscripts submitted for publication under this section will be reviewed by expert Section Editors and undergo a rigorous peer review process. Our goal is to make high-quality and impactful research in biomass catalytic conversion promptly and easily accessible to a wide audience worldwide to accelerate progress in renewable sources conversion, with the aim of contributing to a more sustainable future.

Examples of subject areas covered in this section include:

Theoretical studies

• Fundamental theories applied to biomass catalytic conversion
• Theory/computational methods for the design of catalysts, characterization, and reactivity studies for biomass conversion

Fundamental experimental studies

• Novel catalytic materials for biomass processing: heterogeneous, homogeneous, and biological catalysts
• Fundamental studies of reaction pathways unique to biomass conversion
• Micro and macro kinetics of biomass catalytic conversion
  

Catalytic conversion of chemical platforms

• Physico-, chemo-, bio-, and thermo-catalytic processes (e.g., pretreatment, fractionation, conversion) of biomass including residues from agriculture, forestry, processing plants, and municipal sources, as well as renewable plant and non-food lignocellulosic biomass
• Processes including but not limited to fermentation, hydrolysis, combustion, gasification, pyrolysis, cracking, Fischer-Tropsch, hydrotreating, transesterification, and (ep)oxidation
  

Chemical platforms to conventional and advanced biofuels

• Conversion of bioderived feedstocks (e.g., starch, sugars from corn grain and sugar cane, lignocellulose from woody biomass, corn stalks, forest waste, switchgrass) to chemical platforms (e.g., aqueous sugars, polyols, lignin, syngas, bio-oil, glycerol) and to liquid fuels (e.g., fermentation and cellulosic ethanol and butanol, fatty acids methyl esters (FAMEs), algae and biomass-to-liquid diesel, ethers, air and maritime biofuels)
  

Chemical platforms to bio-chemicals

• Conversion of starch, lignocellulose, bio-syngas, lipids/oil, glycerol/sugars, lignin, and bio-oil to building blocks (e.g., ethanol, lactic acid, succinic acid, xylitol, phenolics, BTX, triglycerides)
• Secondary (e.g., ethylene, polyols, terephthalic acid, linear diacids, fatty alcohols)
• Intermediate (e.g., polyurethanes, polyesters, resins) chemicals as petrochemical substitutes
  

Catalytic technologies

• Technologies for biomass pretreatment and upgrading and lignocellulose fractionation
• Processes for lignocellulose, starch, sugars, and lipids to fuels and chemicals including depolymerization, pyrolysis, gasification, liquid phase processing, reforming, hydrodeoxygenation, transesterification, and (ep)oxidation
• Advances in process technology, innovative processes, catalyst and process scale-up