An investigation of dissolution mechanism of major components in cell walls of agricultural and forest biomass
High-value utilization of agricultural and forest biomass has become an important strategy in many countries.Although the technologies for the biomass utilization have achieved a significant progress,the overall cost of biomass conversion is still high.The major barrier to large-scale conversion of lignocellulosic biomass to biofuels,bio-based chemicals and materials originates from the recalcitrance of plant cell walls.Plant cell walls are typically composed of complex macromolecular compounds consisting of an ordered array of cellulose microfibrils embedded in a matrix of noncellulosic polysaccharides and lignin.Generally,the plant cell wall can be divided into three major layers:middle lamella,primary cell wall,and secondary cell wall.The investigation of plant cell walls is complicated due to the heterogeneous and complex hierarchical structure,as well as the variable chemical composition between different sublayers.The structural complexity and variable chemical composition between different sub-layers form the lignocelluloses recalcitrance together.Given that one of the critical processing steps in biomass conversion involves systematic deconstruction of cell walls,a comprehensive investigation of the architecture of the plant cell wall will not only help us to understand the assembly and biosynthesis of the plant cell wall,but also contribute to improving the efficiency of biomass dissolution.During the biomass conversion,pretreatment is an essential step for altering the morphological and compositional characteristics of biomass to enhance the sugar release in the enzymatic hydrolysis.In this paper,the ultrastructure and topochemistry of plant cell walls which contribute most to the recalcitrance were observed.Mechanisms of acid,alkali and hot water pretreatments to break this obstacle were compared,providing new ideas and new theory for industrial-scale production of biofuels and biomaterials.
agricultural and forest biomasscell wallrecalcitranceultrastructuretopochemistry
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