Advances in Bioconversion of Lignocellulose to Fuels, Chemicals, and Biomaterials

Dear colleagues,

We are pleased to invite you to submit an original research article or a review paper to this Special Issue of Energies on the topic of “Bioconversion of Lignocellulose to Fuels, Chemicals, and Biomaterials”.

The conversion of lignocellulosic biomass to fuels and high-value chemicals to replace fossil-derived counterparts has been the subject of intense research efforts for many years due to the rising concern about the cost of CO₂ emissions and climate change. Despite substantial efforts and impressive progress in the past, the recalcitrance of lignocellulosic biomass remains a major hurdle in the development and operation of cost-effective lignocellulosic biorefineries. Among the various approaches applied in lignocellulose conversion technologies, the biological (or biochemical) conversion route has advantages of high specificity, low energy or chemical consumption, and low environmental pollution. The major challenges in the biological conversion of lignocellulose mainly originate from the recalcitrant and heterogeneous nature of the feedstock, which makes a complete understanding of the mechanisms behind the biological conversion of lignocellulose difficult. Bioconversion and biotechnological aspects of lignocellulose degradation can only advance by taking into consideration the inherent nature of lignocellulosic biomass. Some of the major issues arising from the recalcitrance of lignocellulosic biomass include low conversion efficiencies, the need for costly pretreatment or preprocessing steps, the multiplicity of enzymes required to degrade biomass, and the release of inhibitory compounds in the process, all of which may add costs to the process.

This Special Issue would like to encourage original contributions regarding recent developments, technological advances, and ideas in bioconversion of lignocellulosic biomass to fuels, chemicals, and bioproducts. Research involving numerical studies, recent developments, and the current state of the art and emerging technologies in lignocellulose bioconversion is welcome. Studies of understanding lignocellulose substrate characteristics and complexity, key factors for enzymatic or microbial conversion of lignocellulose, and improving accessibility in enzymatic hydrolysis of lignocellulosic substrates are also encouraged. Additional potential topics related to the biological conversion of lignocellulose include, but are not limited to, the following: pretreatment technology, lignin valorization, protein engineering, recombinant DNA technology, metabolic engineering, genetic engineering of plants, enzymatic kinetic studies, enzyme immobilizations, reaction engineering, consolidated bioprocessing, anaerobic digestion, strain development, and process simulation.

Dr. Daehwan Kim
Prof. Dr. Youngmi Kim
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 250 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for assessment.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Energies is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2600 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.