Distinct roles of residual xylan and lignin in limiting enzymatic hydrolysis of organosolv pretreated loblolly pine and sweetgum

Fungal behavior and recent developments in biopulping technology

Biological pretreatment of wood chips by fungi is a well-known approach prior to mechanical- or chemical pulp production. For this biological approach, a limited number of white-rot fungi with an ability to colonize and selectively degrade lignin are used to pretreat wood chips allowing the remaining cellulose to be processed for further applications. Biopulping is an environmentally friendly technology that can reduce the energy consumption of traditional pulping processes. Fungal pretreatment also reduces the pitch content in the wood chips and improves the pulp quality in terms of brightness, strength, and bleachability. The bleached biopulps are easier to refine compared to pulps produced by conventional methodology. In the last decades, biopulping has been scaled up with pilot trials towards industrial level, with optimization of several intermediate steps and improvement of economic feasibility. Nevertheless, fundamental knowledge on the biochemical mechanisms involved in biopulping is still lacking. Overall, biopulping technology has advanced rapidly during recent decades and pilot mill trials have been implemented. The use of fungi as pretreatment for pulp production is in line with modern circular economy strategies and can be implemented in existing production plants. In this review, we discuss some recent advances in biopulping technology, which can improve mechanical-, chemical-, and organosolv pulping processes along with their mechanisms.

Corn cob hemicelluloses as stabilizer for ice recrystallization inhibition in ice cream

Food stabilizers, such as guar gum and locust bean gum (LBG), are often added to ice cream to improve its texture and to combat its main shelf-life concern - ice recrystallization. Recently these gums have become increasingly expensive due to the limited supplies. In this study, holocellulose nanocrystals (holoCNCs) and hemicelluloses (hemiCs) were prepared from readily available corn cobs and tested for ice recrystallization inhibition (IRI) activities in the 25.0 % sucrose solution and ice cream mixes (ICMs). In the sucrose solution, holoCNCs were not IRI active at a concentration of 0.5 %, but hemiCs demonstrated a good IRI activity, even at 0.1 %. In the ICMs, the IRI activity of hemiCs was better than those of guar gum and LBG at a concentration of 0.2 %. Adding 0.2-0.5 % hemiCs had no negative influences on the physicochemical properties of ICMs and ice cream, including viscosity profile, particle size distribution, overrun, hardness, and meltdown rate. These research findings demonstrated corn cob hemiCs' potential as a more sustainable ice cream stabilizer.

Wood waste valorization: Ethanol based organosolv as a promising recycling process

Wood waste is a valuable material that could constitute an abundant and inexpensive source for the production of new materials the recovery of energy. In Europe, about 46% of wood waste is recycled to particleboard and fiberboard, while the other fraction is incinerated. However, a considerable quantity of wood waste shows potential for its transformation into value-added products due to its compositional quality. In this work, wood waste collected at a mechanical treatment plant underwent organosolv treatment to produce a cellulose pulp suitable for manufacturing containerboard. Three variables (temperature, acid concentration, and ethanol concentration) were investigated to find an optimal solution to produce wood pulp by means of Design of Experiment. Wood waste was microwave-heated at 160 °C for 15 min using an acidified ethanol-water solution (2% w/w H2SO4 and 0.8 w/w ethanol concentration), producing pulp with an average cellulose content of 76% where 93% of initial cellulose was retained. Thanks to a one-pot approach, ethanol was totally recovered, 62% of initial lignin was precipitated, and 20 g/l of hemicellulose-derived sugars solution was obtained. Finally, three wood waste samples collected in different periods of the year yielded comparable outcomes, suggesting a good reproducibility of the organosolv process. ANOVA test with a significance level of 0.01 showed a p-value of 0.029 and 0.235 for cellulose content and cellulose recovery, respectively. This study paves the way for an industrial symbiosis between recycling centers and paper mills located in the same territory.

Eucalyptus red grandis pretreatment with protic ionic liquids: effect of severity and influence of sub/super-critical CO2 atmosphere on pretreatment performance

Deconstruction of lignocellulosic biomass with low-cost ionic liquids (ILs) has proven to be a promising technology that could be implemented in a biorefinery to obtain renewable materials, fuels and chemicals. This study investigates the pretreatment efficacy of the ionoSolv pretreatment of Eucalyptus red grandis using the low-cost ionic liquid triethylammonium hydrogen sulfate ([N₂₂₂₀][HSO₄]) in the presence of 20 wt% water at 10% solids loading. The temperatures investigated were 120 °C and 150 °C. Also, the influence of performing the pretreatment under sub-critical and supercritical CO₂ was investigated. The IL used is very effective in deconstructing eucalyptus, producing cellulose-rich pulps resulting in enzymatic saccharification yields of 86% for some pretreatment conditions. It has been found that under a CO₂ atmosphere, the ionoSolv process is pressure independent. The good performance of this IL in the pretreatment of eucalyptus is promising for the development of a large-scale ionoSolv pretreatment processes.

The influence of lignin on the effectiveness of using a chemithermomechanical pulping based process to pretreat softwood chips and pellets prior to enzymatic hydrolysis

Over the last century the pulp and paper sector has assessed various technologies to fractionate woody biomass to produce strong, bright fibers. Several of these processes have also been assessed for their potential to pretreat and fractionate biomass to enhance the subsequent enzymatic hydrolysis of the cellulosic component. Although many of these pretreatments are effective on agricultural residues, softwoods have proven more recalcitrant, primarily due to their high lignin content and structure. As delignification is too expensive to be used routinely a more economically attractive approach might be to alter the lignin. Recent work has shown that, using a modified chemithermomechanical pulping (CTMP) "front end", lignin can be modified and relocated. This significantly enhanced hemicellulose recovery and enzyme-mediated cellulose hydrolysis of woody biomass. As well as being effective on wood chips, the modified CTMP pretreatment process also enhanced the bioconversion of densified feedstocks such as pellets.

Simultaneous and Efficient Production of Furfural and Subsequent Glucose in MTHF/H2O Biphasic System via Parameter Regulation

Efficient production of furfural from cornstalk in 2-Methyltetrahydrofuran/aqueous (MTHF/H₂O) biphasic system via parameter regulation (e.g., V_MTHF/V_H2O, temperature, time, and H₂SO₄ concentration) was proposed. The resulting solid residues achieved from the different MTHF/H₂O system conditions for furfural production were also to prepare glucose by adding cellulases to increase the high-value applications of cornstalk. A maximum furfural yield (68.1%) was obtained based on reaction condition (V_MTHF:V_H2O = 1:1, 170 °C, 60 min, 0.05 M H₂SO₄). Among these parameters, the concentration of H₂SO₄ had the most obvious effect on the furfural production. The glucose yields of the residues acquired from different MTHF/H₂O processes were enhanced and then a maximum value of 78.9% based on the maximum furfural production conditions was observed. Single factor may not be sufficient to detail the difference in glucose production, and several factors affected the hydrolysis efficiency of the residues. Overall, the MTHF/H₂O system effectively converted cornstalk into furfural and glucose via a simple and environment-friendly process, thus was an ideal manner for the food industries.

Co-production of bio-ethanol, xylonic acid and slow-release nitrogen fertilizer from low-cost straw pulping solid residue

A novel bio-refinery sequence yielding varieties of co-products was developed using straw pulping solid residue. This process utilizes neutral sulfite pretreatment which under optimal conditions (160 °C and 3% (w/v) sulfite charge) provides 64.3% delignification while retaining 90% of cellulose and 67.3% of xylan. The pretreated solids exhibited excellent enzymatic digestibility, with saccharification yields of 86.9% and 81.1% for cellulose and xylan, respectively. After pretreatment, the process of semi-simultaneous saccharification and fermentation (S-SSF) and bio-catalysis was investigated. The results revealed that decreased ethanol yields were achieved when solid loading increased from 5% to 30%. An acceptable ethanol yield of 76.8% was obtained at 20% solid loading. After fermentation, bio-catalysis of xylose remaining in fermentation broth resulted in near 100% xylonic acid (XA) yield at varied solid loadings. To complete the co-product portfolio, oxidation ammoniation of the dissolved lignin successfully transformed it into biodegradable slow-release nitrogen fertilizer with excellent agricultural properties.

Adding tetrahydrofuran to dilute acid pretreatment provides new insights into substrate changes that greatly enhance biomass deconstruction by Clostridium thermocellum and fungal enzymes

BACKGROUND

Consolidated bioprocessing (CBP) by anaerobes, such as Clostridium thermocellum, which combine enzyme production, hydrolysis, and fermentation are promising alternatives to historical economic challenges of using fungal enzymes for biological conversion of lignocellulosic biomass. However, limited research has integrated CBP with real pretreated biomass, and understanding how pretreatment impacts subsequent deconstruction by CBP vs. fungal enzymes can provide valuable insights into CBP and suggest other novel biomass deconstruction strategies. This study focused on determining the effect of pretreatment by dilute sulfuric acid alone (DA) and with tetrahydrofuran (THF) addition via co-solvent-enhanced lignocellulosic fractionation (CELF) on deconstruction of corn stover and Populus with much different recalcitrance by C. thermocellum vs. fungal enzymes and changes in pretreated biomass related to these differences.

RESULTS

Coupling CELF fractionation of corn stover and Populus with subsequent CBP by the anaerobe C. thermocellum completely solubilized polysaccharides left in the pretreated solids within only 48 h without adding enzymes. These results were better than those from the conventional DA followed by either CBP or fungal enzymes or CELF followed by fungal enzyme hydrolysis, especially at viable enzyme loadings. Enzyme adsorption on CELF-pretreated corn stover and CELF-pretreated Populus solids were virtually equal, while DA improved the enzyme accessibility for corn stover more than Populus. Confocal scanning light microscopy (CSLM), transmission electron microscopy (TEM), and NMR characterization of solids from both pretreatments revealed differences in cell wall structure and lignin composition, location, coalescence, and migration-enhanced digestibility of CELF-pretreated solids.

CONCLUSIONS

Adding THF to DA pretreatment (CELF) greatly enhanced deconstruction of corn stover and Populus by fungal enzymes and C. thermocellum CBP, and the CELF-CBP tandem was agnostic to feedstock recalcitrance. Composition measurements, material balances, cellulase adsorption, and CSLM and TEM imaging revealed adding THF enhanced the enzyme accessibility, cell wall fractures, and cellular dislocation and cell wall delamination. Overall, enhanced deconstruction of CELF solids by enzymes and particularly by C. thermocellum could be related to lignin removal and alteration, thereby pointing to these factors being key contributors to biomass recalcitrance as a barrier to low-cost biological conversion to sustainable fuels.

Enhanced enzymatic saccharification of pretreated biomass using glycerol thermal processing (GTP)

Biomass was heated (200-240°C) in the presence of glycerol, for 4-12 min, under shear to disrupt the native cell wall architecture. The impact of this method, named glycerol thermal processing (GTP), on saccharification efficiency of the hardwood Liquidambar styraciflua, and a control cellulose sample was studied as a function of treatment severity. Furthermore, the enzymatic conversion of samples with varying compositions was studied after extraction of the structural polymers. Interestingly, the sweet gum processed materials crystallinity index increased by 10% of the initial value. The experiments revealed that the residual lignin was not a barrier to limiting the digestibility of cellulose after pretreatment yielding up to 70% glucose based on the starting wood material. Further xylan removal greatly improved the cellulose hydrolysis rate, converting nearly 70% of the cellulose into glucose within 24h, and reaching 78% of ultimate glucan digestibility after 72 h.

Identification and characterization of putative xylose and cellobiose transporters in Aspergillus nidulans

BACKGROUND

The conversion of lignocellulosic biomass to biofuels (second-generation biofuel production) is an environmentally friendlier alternative to petroleum-based energy sources. Enzymatic deconstruction of lignocellulose, catalyzed by filamentous fungi such as Aspergillus nidulans, releases a mixture of mono- and polysaccharides, including hexose (glucose) and pentose (xylose) sugars, cellodextrins (cellobiose), and xylooligosaccharides (xylobiose). These sugars can subsequently be fermented by yeast cells to ethanol. One of the major drawbacks in this process lies in the inability of yeast, such as Saccharomyces cerevisiae, to successfully internalize sugars other than glucose. The aim of this study was, therefore, to screen the genome of A. nidulans, which encodes a multitude of sugar transporters, for transporters able to internalize non-glucose sugars and characterize them when introduced into S. cerevisiae.

RESULTS

This work identified two proteins in A. nidulans, CltA and CltB, with roles in cellobiose transport and cellulose signaling, respectively. CltA, when introduced into S. cerevisiae, conferred growth on low and high concentrations of cellobiose. Deletion of cltB resulted in reduced growth and extracellular cellulase activity in A. nidulans in the presence of cellobiose. CltB, when introduced into S. cerevisiae, was not able to confer growth on cellobiose, suggesting that this protein is a sensor rather than a transporter. However, we have shown that the introduction of additional functional copies of CltB increases the growth in the presence of low concentrations of cellobiose, strongly indicating CltB is able to transport cellobiose. Furthermore, a previously identified glucose transporter, HxtB, was also found to be a major xylose transporter in A. nidulans. In S. cerevisiae, HxtB conferred growth on xylose which was accompanied by ethanol production.

CONCLUSIONS

This work identified a cellobiose transporter, a xylose transporter, and a putative cellulose transceptor in A. nidulans. This is the first time that a sensor role for a protein in A. nidulans has been proposed. Both transporters are also able to transport glucose, highlighting the preference of A. nidulans for this carbon source. This work provides a basis for future studies which aim at characterizing and/or genetically engineering Aspergillus spp. transporters, which, in addition to glucose, can also internalize other carbon sources, to improve transport and fermentation of non-glucose sugars in S. cerevisiae.

Organic solvent pretreatment of lignocellulosic biomass for biofuels and biochemicals: A review

Lignocellulosic biomass represents the largest potential volume and lowest cost for biofuel and biochemical production. Pretreatment is an essential component of biomass conversion process, affecting a majority of downstream processes, including enzymatic hydrolysis, fermentation, and final product separation. Organic solvent pretreatment is recognized as an emerging way ahead because of its inherent advantages, such as the ability to fractionate lignocellulosic biomass into cellulose, lignin, and hemicellulose components with high purity, as well as easy solvent recovery and solvent reuse. Objectives of this review were to update and extend previous works on pretreatment of lignocellulosic biomass for biofuels and biochemicals using organic solvents, especially on ethanol, methanol, ethylene glycol, glycerol, acetic acid, and formic acid. Perspectives and recommendations were given to fully describe implementation of proper organic solvent pretreatment for future research.

Effect of alkali lignins with different molecular weights from alkali pretreated rice straw hydrolyzate on enzymatic hydrolysis

This study investigated the effect of alkali lignins with different molecular weights on enzymatic hydrolysis of lignocellulose. Different alkali lignins fractions, which were obtained from cascade ultrafiltration, were added into the dilute acid pretreated (DAP) and alkali pretreated (AP) rice straws respectively during enzymatic hydrolysis. The results showed that the addition of alkali lignins enhanced the hydrolysis and the enhancement for hydrolysis increased with increasing molecular weights of alkali lignins, with maximum enhancement being 28.69% for DAP and 20.05% for AP, respectively. The enhancement was partly attributed to the improved cellulase activity, and filter paper activity increased by 18.03% when adding lignin with highest molecular weight. It was found that the enhancement of enzymatic hydrolysis was correlated with the adsorption affinity of cellulase on alkali lignins, and the difference in surface charge and hydrophobicity of alkali lignins were responsible for the difference in affinity between cellulase and lignins.

Specific tracking of xylan using fluorescent-tagged carbohydrate-binding module 15 as molecular probe

BACKGROUND

Xylan has been identified as a physical barrier which limits cellulose accessibility by covering the outer surface of fibers and interfibrillar space. Therefore, tracking xylan is a prerequisite for understanding and optimizing lignocellulosic biomass processes.

RESULTS

In this study, we developed a novel xylan tracking approach using a two-domain probe called OC15 which consists of a fusion of Cellvibrio japonicus carbohydrate-binding domain 15 with the fluorescent protein mOrange2. The new probe specifically binds to xylan with an affinity similar to that of CBM15. The sensitivity of the OC15-xylan detection approach was compared to that of standard methods such as X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) and chemical composition analysis (NREL/TP-510-42618). All three approaches were used to analyze the variations of xylan content of kraft pulp fibers. XPS, which allows for surface analysis of fibers, did not clearly indicate changes in xylan content. Chemical composition analysis responded to the changes in xylan content, but did not give any specific information related to the fibers surface. Interestingly, only the OC15 probe enabled the highly sensitive detection of xylan variations at the surface of kraft pulp fibers. At variance with the other methods, the OC15 probe can be used in a high throughput format.

CONCLUSIONS

We developed a rapid and high throughput approach for the detection of changes in xylan exposure at the surface of paper fibers. The introduction of this method into the lignocellulosic biomass-based industries should revolutionize the understanding and optimization of most wood biomass processes.

The correlation between cellulose allomorphs (I and II) and conversion after removal of hemicellulose and lignin of lignocellulose

H2SO4, NaOH and H3PO4 were applied to decompose lignocellulose samples (giant reeds, pennisetum and cotton stalks) to investigate the correlation between cellulose allomorphs (cellulose I and II) and conversion of cellulose. The effect of removal of hemicellulose and lignin on the surface morphology, crystallinity index (CrI), cellulose allomorphs (cellulose I and II), and enzymatic hydrolysis under different pretreatments was also studied. CrI caused by H3PO4 pretreatment reached 11.19%, 24.93% and 8.15% for the three samples, respectively. Corn stalk showed highest conversion of cellulose among three samples, irrespective of the pretreatment used. This accounted for the widely use of corn stalk as the renewable crop substrate to synthesize biofuels like ethanol. CrI of cellulose I (CrI-I) negatively affects cellulose conversion but CrI of cellulose II (CrI-II) positively affects cellulose conversion. It contributes to make the strategy to transform cellulose I to cellulose II and enhancing enzymatic hydrolysis of lignocellulose.

Contrasting effects of hardwood and softwood organosolv lignins on enzymatic hydrolysis of lignocellulose

Identifying an appropriate parameter to elucidate effects of lignin on enzymatic hydrolysis is essential to understand the interactions between enzymes and lignin. Contrasting effects of hardwood organosolv lignin (EOL-SG) and softwood organosolv lignin (EOL-LP) on enzymatic hydrolysis were observed. The addition of EOL-SG (8 g/L) significantly improved the 72 h hydrolysis yields of organosolv pretreated sweetgum (OPSG) and loblolly pine (OPLP) from 49.3% to 68.6% and from 41.2% to 60.8%, respectively. In contrast, the addition of EOL-LP decreased the 72 h hydrolysis yields of OPSG and OPLP to 42.0% and 38.1%, respectively. A strong correlation between the distribution coefficients of cellulase enzymes on lignins and the changes of hydrolysis yields indicated that the inhibitory or stimulatory effects of organosolv lignins on enzymatic hydrolysis were governed by the distribution coefficients (R). The different R values probably were related to the electrostatic interactions, hydrophobic interactions and hydrogen bondings between enzymes and lignin.

Remarkable solvent and extractable lignin effects on enzymatic digestibility of organosolv pretreated hardwood

Low solvent concentration effect on substrate digestibility of ethanol organosolv pretreated sweetgum was examined. Surprisingly, lower ethanol concentration in organosolv pretreatments resulted in faster initial rates and higher 72h hydrolysis yields in pretreated substrates. A strong correlation (r(2)=0.96) between pretreatment combined severity factor and residual xylan/glucan ratio was observed. The residual xylan/glucan ratio was associated with the initial hydrolysis rate closely. Furthermore, it was found that preserving extractable lignin in the pretreated substrates could improve enzymatic hydrolysis yield by 33%. This has an important implication in reducing the pretreatment and enzyme cost, because the typical solvent washing after pretreatment could be eliminated and preserving extractable lignin could reduce enzyme loading. Finally, we observed that xylan removal by xylanase could improve the initial rate by 53% and increase the 72h hydrolysis yield by 21%. The extractable lignin precipitation on pretreated substrates increased the 72h hydrolysis yield by 10%.