Influence of different chemical pretreatments of elephant grass (Pennisetum purpureum, Schum.) used as a substrate for cellulase and xylanase production in submerged cultivation.

This study evaluated the potential use of elephant grass biomass, a highly productive species, for cellulase and xylanase production by the cellulolytic mutant Penicillium echinulatum 9A02S1 in submerged cultivation, using untreated biomass, biomass pretreated with different concentrations of NaOH, H2SO4 or NH4OH, or biomass pretreated with H2O at 121 °C. For filter paper activity, all cultivation carried out with pretreated elephant grass under the evaluated conditions showed superior activity when compared with the control (untreated elephant grass). The activities of endoglucanases and β-glucosidases were higher in the cultivation prepared from pretreated samples than the control made with cellulose (Celuflok(®)).

Ethanol production from sugars obtained during enzymatic hydrolysis of elephant grass (Pennisetum purpureum, Schum.) pretreated by steam explosion.

In this work, steam explosion was used a pretreatment method to improve the conversion of elephant grass (Pennisetum purpureum) to cellulosic ethanol. This way, enzymatic hydrolysis of vaccum-drained and water-washed steam-treated substrates was carried out with Penicillium echinulatum enzymes while Saccharomyces cerevisiae CAT-1 was used for fermentation. After 48 h of hydrolysis, the highest yield of reducing sugars was obtained from vaccum-drained steam-treated substrates that were produced after 10 min at 200 °C (863.