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The effect of chemical and physical characteristics of spruce SEW pulps on enzymatic hydrolysis

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Abstract

Conifers, which are the most abundant biomass species in Nordic countries, USA, Canada and Russia, exhibit strong resistance towards depolymerization by cellulolytic enzymes. At present, it is still not possible to isolate a single structural feature which would govern the rate and degree of enzymatic hydrolysis. On the other hand, the forest residues alone represent an important potential for biochemical production of biofuels. In this study, the effect of substrate properties on the enzymatic hydrolysis of softwood was studied. Stem wood spruce chips were fractionated by SO2–ethanol–water (SEW) treatment to produce pulps of varying composition by applying different operating conditions. The SEW technology efficiently fractionates different types of lignocellulosic biomass by rapidly dissolving hemicelluloses and lignin. Cellulose remains fully in the solid residue which is then treated by enzymes to release glucose. The differences in enzymatic digestibility of the spruce SEW pulp fibers were interpreted in terms of their chemical and physical characteristics. A strong correlation between the residual lignin content of SEW pulp and enzymatic digestibility was observed whereas cellulose degree of polymerization and hemicellulose content of pulp were not as important. For the pulps containing about 1.5 % (w/w) lignin, 90 % enzymatic digestibility was achieved at 10 FPU enzyme charge and 24 h of hydrolysis time.

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Acknowledgments

Financial support of Tekes (Finnish Funding Agency for Innovation) and industrial project members (ABB, American Process Inc., Kemira, Neste Oil, Stora Enso, UPM) through the BioRefine program is greatly acknowledged. Thanks to Dr. Paavo Penttilä and Prof. Ritva Serimaa at University of Helsinki for the analysis of crystallinity of cellulose; Dr. Shrikant Survase and Johanna Aura for their help in the analysis of the enzyme properties; Rita Hatakka for the HPAEC analyses and Leena Nolvi for the FSP analysis. Authors also thank Dr. Aniko Varnai and Dr. Jenni Rahikainen for valuable discussions.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Forest Products Technology, Aalto University, P.O. Box 16300, 00076, Aalto, Finland

    Minna Yamamoto, Mikhail Iakovlev & Adriaan van Heiningen

  2. Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering, University of Maine, 5737 Jenness Hall, Orono, ME, 04469-5737, USA

    Adriaan van Heiningen

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  1. Minna Yamamoto
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  2. Mikhail Iakovlev
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  3. Adriaan van Heiningen
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Correspondence to Minna Yamamoto.

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Yamamoto, M., Iakovlev, M. & van Heiningen, A. The effect of chemical and physical characteristics of spruce SEW pulps on enzymatic hydrolysis. Cellulose 21, 3395–3407 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10570-014-0396-y

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