Search Results (16)

The crystallinity of cellulose substrates is a key factor in their processability, as well as an indication of their susceptibility to undergo sensitive reactions (such as enzymatic saccharification) with high yields. FT-IR and X-ray diffraction spectroscopy are useful, reliable, and easy-to-reach solid-state characterization methods for assessing the crystallinity of different cellulose substrates including wood and wood-based materials. Due to their specific methodology, they can be used to analyze not only starting materials and their final products but also intermediates. Data obtained by these methods substantiated the structural changes in cellulose substrates, as well as the alterations that occurred in their supramolecular architectures. The conversion of crystalline cellulose I into amorphous cellulose II during enzymatic saccharification, with or without pre-treatment (solubilization in ILs), was evidenced beyond any reasonable doubt by FT-IR and XRD experimental results. Enzyme hydrolysis rates of the ILs-treated cellulose substrates can be significantly increased, as evidenced by reducing sugar yields. Crystallinity index values for cellulose of different origins (initial, pre-treated with ILs, and hydrolyzed with enzyme, as well as cellulose submitted to one-pot procedure with ILs and enzyme) can be determined using FTIR and X-ray diffraction data and discussed for comparison purposes. The same solid-state characterization methods can be also successfully employed for investigation of surface changes, expressed as cellulose crystallinity, in wood samples before and after impregnation with natural-based products, as well as under biodegradation conditions in soil burial tests. Full article

The bioconversion of lignocellulosic biomass, which are abundant and renewable resources, into liquid fuels and bulk chemicals is a promising solution to the current challenges of resource scarcity, energy crisis, and carbon emissions. Considering the separation of some end-products, it is necessary to firstly obtain a high concentration separated fermentable sugar solution, and then conduct fermentation. For this purpose, in this study, using acid catalyzed steam explosion pretreated corn stover (ACSE-CS) and corn cob residues (CCR) as cellulosic substrate, respectively, the batch feeding strategies and enzymatic hydrolysis conditions were investigated to achieve the efficient enzymatic hydrolysis at high solid loading. It was shown that the fermentable sugar solutions of 161.2 g/L and 205 g/L were obtained, respectively, by fed-batch enzymatic hydrolysis of ACSE-CS under 30% of final solid loading with 10 FPU/g DM of crude cellulase, and of CCR at 27% of final solid loading with 8 FPU/g DM of crude cellulase, which have the potential to be directly applied to the large-scale fermentation process without the need for concentration, and the conversion of glucan in ACSE-CS and CCR reached 80.9% and 87.6%, respectively, at 72 h of enzymatic hydrolysis. This study also applied the fed-batch simultaneous saccharification and co-fermentation process to effectively convert the two cellulosic substrates into ethanol, and the ethanol concentrations in fermentation broth reached 46.1 g/L and 72.8 g/L for ACSE-CS and CCR, respectively, at 144 h of fermentation. This study provides a valuable reference for the establishment of “sugar platform” based on lignocellulosic biomass and the production of cellulosic ethanol. Full article

Drylands in Brazil have been exploring sisal (Agave sisalana) as an essential source of income. However, the solid residues generated because of this activity still need suitable destinations; therefore, research has been carried out to transform them into added-value products. Therefore, the present study evaluated the potential of sisal or agave solid residue as a precursor feedstock for second-generation ethanol production. Acid and acid–alkaline pretreatments were carried out on sisal residues to enrich the biomass with cellulose and maximize enzymatic digestibility. Second-generation ethanol production was carried out using Semi-simultaneous saccharification and fermentation (SSSF). Regardless of catalyst dosage and incubation time, oxalic acid pretreatments generated samples with a similar chemical composition to those pretreated with sulfuric acid. However, samples pretreated with oxalic acid showed lower enzymatic digestibility. Samples pretreated with oxalic acid and sodium hydroxide obtained 14.28 g/L of glucose and cellulose conversion of 79.1% (at 5% solids), while 21.49 g/L glucose and 91.2% of cellulose conversion were obtained in the hydrolysis of pretreated samples with sulfuric acid and sodium hydroxide combined pretreatments. The pretreatment sequence efficiently reduced cellulase dosage from 20 to 10 FPU/g without compromising sugar release. SSSF achieved maximum production of 40 g/L ethanol and 43% ethanol conversion using 30% solids and gradually adding biomass and cellulases. Full article

The white-rot fungus Pleurotus ostreatus was used for biological pretreatment of peach palm (Bactris gasipaes) lignocellulosic wastes. Non-treated and treated B. gasipaes inner sheaths and peel were submitted to hydrolysis using a commercial cellulase preparation from T. reesei. The amounts of total reducing sugars and glucose obtained from the 30 d-pretreated inner sheaths were seven and five times higher, respectively, than those obtained from the inner sheaths without pretreatment. No such improvement was found, however, in the pretreated B. gasipaes peels. Scanning electronic microscopy of the lignocellulosic fibers was performed to verify the structural changes caused by the biological pretreatments. Upon the biological pretreatment, the lignocellulosic structures of the inner sheaths were substantially modified, making them less ordered. The main features of the modifications were the detachment of the fibers, cell wall collapse and, in several cases, the formation of pores in the cell wall surfaces. The peel lignocellulosic fibers showed more ordered fibrils and no modification was observed after pre-treatment. In conclusion, a seven-fold increase in the enzymatic saccharification of the Bactris gasipaes inner sheath was observed after pre-treatment, while no improvement in enzymatic saccharification was observed in the B. gasipaes peel. Full article

Corncobs are a plentiful lignocellulosic material that can be utilized for energy production as well as the generation of other high-value products. Within the modern concept of biorefineries, we present processes conducted in a column reactor for the valorization of corncobs as a substrate for ethanol and xylitol production. In the first step, corncobs were subjected to acid hydrolysis, resulting in a hemicellulosic hydrolysate rich in xylose sugars intended for xylitol production by Candida tropicalis UFMGBX12-a. The Y_P/S (yield coefficient of product to substrate) and Q_P (productivity) values were approximately 0.2 g/g and 0.15 g/L·h, respectively, for the assays conducted in the column reactor. Next, the remaining solid portion of cellulignin was used for ethanol production through semi-simultaneous saccharification and fermentation process by Scheffersomyces parashehatae UFMG-HM 52.2. This approach involved an intensified successive process consisting of alkaline pretreatment of cellulignin, followed by enzymatic hydrolysis and fermentative processes conducted in the same reactor without biomass transfer. After obtaining the enzymatic hydrolysate, a Q_P value of 0.4 g/L·h for ethanol production was observed in the fermentation process conducted in the column reactor. The results demonstrate the potential of corncobs as a carbon source for biomolecules production, utilizing a process conducive to scale-up. Full article

Microalgae, which accumulate considerable carbohydrates, are a potential source of glucose for biofuel fermentation. In this study, we investigated the enzymatic hydrolysis efficiency of wet microalgal biomass compared with freeze-dried and oven-dried biomasses, both with and without an acidic pretreatment. With the dilute sulfuric acid pretreatment followed by amy (α-amylase and amyloglucosidase) and cellulase hydrolysis, approximately 95.4% of the glucose was recovered; however, 88.5% was released by the pretreatment with 2% (w/v) sulfuric acid, which indicates the potential of the acids for direct saccharification process. There were no considerable differences in the glucose yields among the three kinds of materials. In the direct amy hydrolysis without any pretreatment, a 78.7% glucose yield was obtained, and the addition of cellulase had no significant effect on the hydrolysis to glucose. Compared with the oven-dried biomass, the wet biomass produced a substantially higher glucose yield, which is possibly because the cross-linked cells of the oven-dried biomass prevented the accessibility of the enzymes. According to the results, the fresh microalgal biomass without cell disruption can be directly used for enzymatic hydrolysis to produce glucose. The enzymatic hydrolysate of the wet microalgal biomass was successfully used for acetone–butanol–ethanol (ABE) fermentation, which produced 7.2 g/L of ABE, indicating the application potential of wet microalgae in the bioalcohol fuel fermentation process. Full article

Cellulosic ethanol is regarded as a perfect additive for petrol fuels for global carbon neutralization. As bioethanol conversion requires strong biomass pretreatment and overpriced enzymatic hydrolysis, it is increasingly considered in the exploration of biomass processes with fewer chemicals for cost-effective biofuels and value-added bioproducts. In this study, we performed optimal liquid-hot-water pretreatment (190 °C for 10 min) co-supplied with 4% FeCl₃ to achieve the near-complete biomass enzymatic saccharification of desirable corn stalk for high bioethanol production, and all the enzyme-undigestible lignocellulose residues were then examined as active biosorbents for high Cd adsorption. Furthermore, by incubating Trichoderma reesei with the desired corn stalk co-supplied with 0.05% FeCl₃ for the secretion of lignocellulose-degradation enzymes in vivo, we examined five secreted enzyme activities elevated by 1.3–3.0-fold in vitro, compared to the control without FeCl₃ supplementation. After further supplying 1:2 (w/w) FeCl₃ into the T. reesei-undigested lignocellulose residue for the thermal-carbonization process, we generated highly porous carbon with specific electroconductivity raised by 3–12-fold for the supercapacitor. Therefore, this work demonstrates that FeCl₃ can act as a universal catalyst for the full-chain enhancement of biological, biochemical, and chemical conversions of lignocellulose substrates, providing a green-like strategy for low-cost biofuels and high-value bioproducts. Full article

Bioconversion of the complex carbohydrates present in lignocellulosic biomass into simple sugars, in order to obtain biofuels and bio-based products, is still limited by the low performance of the enzymatic saccharification reaction and the high cost of cellulolytic enzymes. Low-cost additives such as soybean protein can reduce the unproductive adsorption of cellulases onto lignin, increasing conversion rates and reducing enzyme losses. Here, investigation was made of the effects of different soybean protein fractions, extracted in-house, on the enzymatic saccharification of hydrothermally pretreated sugarcane bagasse. The glucose released during biomass saccharification increased by up to 76% in the presence of the in-house extracted soybean protein, compared to the control (without additive). A remarkable finding was that the technique allowed the enzyme loading to be decreased four-fold. The results suggested that the alkali-extracted proteins presented high surface hydrophobicity, which enhanced their interaction with lignin and reduced the unproductive binding of cellulases. Among the main soybean protein fractions, glycinin had the best effect in improving saccharification, which could have been due to its higher hydrophobicity. Hence, in-house extracted soybean proteins seem to be interesting alternative additives capable of increasing the lignocellulosic biomass conversion efficiency in future biorefineries. Full article

Corncobs of four different corn varieties were physically segregated into two different anatomical portions, namely the corncob outer (CO) and corncob pith (CP). The biomass composition analysis of both the CO and CP was performed by four different methods. The CP showed a higher carbohydrate and lower lignin content (83.32% and 13.58%, respectively) compared with the CO (79.93% and 17.12%, respectively) in all of the methods. The syringyl/guaiacyl (S/G) ratio was observed to be higher in the CP (1.34) than in the CO (1.28). The comprehensive physical characterization of both samples substantiated the lower crystallinity and lower thermal stability that was observed in the CP compared to the CO. These properties make the CP more susceptible to glycanases, as evident from the enzymatic saccharification of CP carried out with a commercial cellulase and xylanase in this work. The yields obtained were 70.57% and 88.70% of the respective theoretical yields and were found to be equal to that of pure cellulose and xylan substrates. These results support the feasibility of the tailored valorization of corncob anatomical portions, such as enzymatic production of xylooligosaccharides from CP without pretreatment combined with the bioethanol production from pretreated CO to achieve an economical biorefinery output from corncob feedstock. Full article

Being a lignocellulose-rich biomass, pineapple leaves waste (PL) could be a potential raw material for the production of biofuel, biochemicals, and other value-added products. The main aim of this study was to investigate the potential of pineapple leaves in the sustainable production of bioethanol via stepwise saccharification and fermentation. For this purpose, PL was subjected to hydrothermal pretreatment in a high-pressure reactor at 150 °C for 20 min without any catalyst, resulting in a maximum reducing sugar yield of 38.1 g/L in the liquid fraction after solid-liquid separation of the pretreated hydrolysate. Inhibitors (phenolics, furans) and oligomers production were also monitored during the pretreatment in the liquid fraction of pretreated PL. Enzymatic hydrolysis (EH) of both pretreated biomass slurry and cellulose-rich solid fraction maintained at a solid loading (dry basis) of 5% wt. was performed at 50 °C and 150 rpm using commercial cellulase at an enzyme dose of 10 FPU/gds. EH resulted in a glucose yield of 13.7 and 18.4 g/L from pretreated slurry and solid fractions, respectively. Fermentation of the sugar syrup obtained by EH of pretreated slurry and the solid fraction was performed at 30 °C for 72 h using Saccharomyces cerevisiae WLP300, resulting in significant ethanol production with more than 91% fermentation efficiency. This study reveals the potential of pineapple leaves waste for biorefinery application, and the role of inhibitors in the overall efficiency of the process when using whole biomass slurry as a substrate. Full article

Wheat straw (WS) is an excellent raw material for biofuel ethanol production. However, the recalcitrance of WS prevents its efficient utilization. In this study, a novel ternary deep eutectic solvent (DES) was developed for enhancing component separation and enzymatic saccharification of WS. Without any detoxification and sterilization, the DES-treated WS hydrolysate was successfully used to produce ethanol. Overall, this research evaluated the effect of ternary DES pretreatment on WS at various temperatures and adjusted the enzyme load, substrate concentration, and fermentation method of treated WS. The results suggested that the cellulose recovery of treated WS after DES pretreatment (120 °C, 1 h) was 94.73 ± 0.22%, while the removal of xylan and lignin reached 89.53 ± 0.36% and 80.05 ± 0.62%, respectively. Importantly, at enzyme loading of 11.4 filter paper unit (FPU)/g WS with 16% fermentation substrate concentration, 91.15 ± 1.07% of cellulose was hydrolyzed, and the glucose yield was 71.58 ± 1.34%. The maximum ethanol yield of DES-treated WS was 81.40 ± 0.01%. Full article

Cellulosic fibers from date palm are among the most promising lignocellulose feedstock for biorefinery purposes. The world production is between 1.9 and 2.4 million t/year. Initially, a pretreatment with dilute-sulphuric acid of these fibers was performed using a response surface methodology, with temperature and process time as factors. The aim is to produce bioethanol from young and old fibers from date palm, Phoenix dactylifera L. Optimal thermochemical pretreatment conditions for both fibers palms were 220 °C in hydrothermal conditions (without acid); in these conditions pretreated young fibers presented a maximum content in holocelluloses of 45.18% and old fibers 61.97%. Subsequently, during the enzymatic hydrolysis a maximum yield of total reducing sugars (TRS) was reached, 46.32 g/100 g for pretreated dry young fibers and 48.54 g/100 g for pretreated dry old fibers. After enzymatic saccharification, hydrolysates were fermented by Pachysolen tannophilus (ATCC 32691) to ethanol, reaching yields (Y_E/TRS) of 37.94 g ethanol/100 g of TRS for young fibers and 35.84 g ethanol/100 g of TRS for old fibers. Globally, considering the full process, in the fermentation of the hydrolysates, a yield (Y_E) of 10.64 g ethanol/100 g of dry young fibers and 10.88 g ethanol/100 g of dry old fibers was reached. Full article

Synergistic effect of cellulase and hemicellulase (xylanase) was evaluated because lignocellulosic material is a heterogeneous complex of cellulose and hemicellulose. Various effects of HTec2 addition on enzymatic saccharification and fermentation were evaluated using two different substrates such as corn stover and rice straw. Corn stover and rice straw were pretreated by the LMAA (low-moisture anhydrous ammonia) method at the preselected same conditions (90 °C, 120 h, moisture content = 50%, NH₃ loading = 0.1 g NH₃/g). It was observed that the enzymatic saccharification yield of pretreated corn stover (76.4% for glucan digestibility) was higher than that of pretreated rice straw (70.9% for glucan) using CTec2 cellulase without HTec2 addition. Glucan digestibility of pretreated corn stover was significantly increased from 76.4% to 91.1% when the HTec2/CTec2 (v/v) increased from 0 to 10. However, it was interesting that the ethanol production was decreased from 89.9% to 76.3% for SSF and 118.0% to 87.9% for SSCF at higher HTec2/CTec2. As the glucan loading increased from 2.0% to 7.0%, the ethanol yields of both SSF and SSCF were decreased from 96.3% to 88.9% and from 116.6% to 92.4%, respectively. In addition, the smallest inoculum size (optical density of 0.25) resulted in the highest ethanol production (20.5 g/L). Full article

The enzymatic hydrolysis of cellulose is inhibited by non-productive adsorption of cellulases to lignin, and that is particularly problematic with lignin-rich materials such as softwood. Although conventional surfactants alleviate non-productive adsorption, using biosurfactants in softwood hydrolysis has not been reported. In this study, the effects of four biosurfactants, namely horse-chestnut escin, Pseudomonas aeruginosa rhamnolipid, and saponins from red and white quinoa varieties, on the enzymatic saccharification of steam-pretreated spruce were investigated. The used biosurfactants improved hydrolysis, and the best-performing one was escin, which led to cellulose conversions above 90%, decreased by around two-thirds lignin inhibition of Avicel hydrolysis, and improved hydrolysis of pretreated spruce by 24%. Red quinoa saponins (RQS) addition resulted in cellulose conversions above 80%, which was around 16% higher than without biosurfactants, and it was more effective than adding rhamnolipid or white quinoa saponins. Cellulose conversion improved with the increase in RQS addition up to 6 g/100 g biomass, but no significant changes were observed above that dosage. Although saponins are known to inhibit yeast growth, no inhibition of Saccharomyces cerevisiae fermentation of hydrolysates produced with RQS addition was detected. This study shows the potential of biosurfactants for enhancing the enzymatic hydrolysis of steam-pretreated softwood. Full article

Washing and drying are common steps for oil palm empty fruit bunch (OPEFB) preparation prior to pretreatment. However, the mass balance of OPEFB preparation proved a major loss of OPEFB during the washing and drying steps. An indigenous fungus, Schizophyllum commune ENN1 was used for delignification of unwashed OPEFB in biological pretreatment without nutrient addition. S. commune ENN1 achieved a maximum lignin removal of 53.8% after 14 days of biological pretreatment of unwashed OPEFB. S. commune ENN1 was able to grow on unwashed OPEFB during biological pretreatment at 55% of moisture content and 5% of oil residue. The highest amount of reducing sugars obtained from OPEFB pretreated by S. commune ENN1 was 230.4 ± 0.19 mg/g with 54% of hydrolysis yield at 96 h. In comparison, the sugar yield of OPEFB pretreated by Phanerochaete chrysosporium was 101.2 ± 0.04 mg/g. This study showed that S. commune ENN1 was feasible to remove lignin of OPEFB through biological pretreatment for enzymatic saccharification without washing and addition of nutrients. Full article