The Food, Energy & Water Laboratory for Sustainability has the pleasure to announce the publication of the first 2022 peer reviewed article, which was released online on April 3rd, 2022 in the journal BioEnergy Research! This publication is a result of a strong collaboration between Dr. Ana Morais from The University of Kansas and Dr. Hector Ruiz from the Autonomous University of Coahuila, Mexico.
The published article is entitled "Enzymatic Hydrolysis, Kinetic Modeling of Hemicellulose Fraction, and Energy Efficiency of Autohydrolysis Pretreatment Using Agave Bagasse" aimed to determine engineering design parameters and optimal processing conditions for autohydrolysis of Agave bagasse, which is an abundant lignocellulosic residue in Mexico. Check out the abstract for this publication below and click here to access the publication online!
Abstract
Agave bagasse is a promising and interesting raw material for the development of second-generation biorefineries. However, the intrinsic resistance (recalcitrance) of lignocellulose biomass to enzymatic hydrolysis is a barrier to its effective conversion into fermentable sugars. Therefore, an autohydrolysis process under subcritical conditions is an alternative to provide the fractionation of biomass in terms of biorefinery concept. In this work, agave bagasse as a feedstock was subjected to the autohydrolysis pretreatment at controlled operational conditions (180°C — 50 min), providing fractionation of biomass > 41.71 % glucan content in the pretreated solid phase (cellulose+lignin fraction). Also, a kinetic modeling of hemicellulose fraction (liquid phase after the pretreatment) for the depolymerization has been studied, considering a linear kinetic mechanism. The cellulolytic hydrolysis process improved the glucose concentration by 40.98 g/L at 72 h with a saccharification yield conversion of 82.58%. The energy efficiency (η) during the autohydrolysis pretreatment was determined (1.039 gsugars/MJ). The design and development of this process will allow establishing optimal operating conditions and energy efficiency for the development of biorefineries with an impact on the circular bioeconomy.
Authors: Shiva, Rosa M. Rodríguez-Jasso, Gilver Rosero-Chasoy, Iosvany López-Sandin, Ana Rita C. Morais & Héctor A. Ruiz
Journal: BioEnergy Research
