Dilution-to-Stimulation/Extinction Method: a Combination Enrichment Strategy To Develop a Minimal and Versatile Lignocellulolytic Bacterial Consortium.

The engineering of complex communities can be a successful path to understand the ecology of microbial systems and improve biotechnological processes. Here, we developed a strategy to assemble a minimal and effective lignocellulolytic microbial consortium (MELMC) using a sequential combination of dilution-to-stimulation and dilution-to-extinction approaches. The consortium was retrieved from Andean forest soil and selected through incubation in liquid medium with a mixture of three types of agricultural plant residues.

Initial Approximation to the Design and Construction of a Photocatalysis Reactor for Phenol Degradation with TiO Nanoparticles.

A photoreactor was designed, built, and optimized to carry out the degradation of phenol. To achieve this, phenol concentration was used as the reference to compare the photocatalysis reaction efficiency obtained through this research with results from other studies. Additionally, during the building process, different types of glass were evaluated with the objective of finding a functional and economic material to build the photoreactor.

Selectivity and delignification kinetics for oxidative short-term lime pretreatment of poplar wood, Part I: Constant-pressure.

Kinetic models applied to oxygen bleaching of paper pulp focus on the degradation of polymers, either lignin or carbohydrates. Traditionally, they separately model different moieties that degrade at three different rates: rapid, medium, and slow. These models were successfully applied to lignin and carbohydrate degradation of poplar wood submitted to oxidative pretreatment with lime at the following conditions: temperature 110-180°C, total pressure 7.

Surface and ultrastructural characterization of raw and pretreated switchgrass.

The US Department of Energy-funded Biomass Refining CAFI (Consortium for Applied Fundamentals and Innovation) project has developed leading pretreatment technologies for application to switchgrass and has evaluated their effectiveness in recovering sugars from the coupled operations of pretreatment and enzymatic hydrolysis. Key chemical and physical characteristics have been determined for pretreated switchgrass samples. Several analytical microscopy approaches utilizing instruments in the Biomass Surface Characterization Laboratory (BSCL) at the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) have been applied to untreated and CAFI-pretreated switchgrass samples.

Effects of enzyme loading and β-glucosidase supplementation on enzymatic hydrolysis of switchgrass processed by leading pretreatment technologies.

The objective of this work is to investigate the effects of cellulase loading and β-glucosidase supplementation on enzymatic hydrolysis of pretreated Dacotah switchgrass. To assess the difference among various pretreatment methods, the profiles of sugars and intermediates were determined for differently treated substrates. For all pretreatments, 72 h glucan/xylan digestibilities increased sharply with enzyme loading up to 25mg protein/g-glucan, after which the response varied depending on the pretreatment method.

Oxidative lime pretreatment of Dacotah switchgrass.

Oxidative lime pretreatment increases the enzymatic digestibility of lignocellulosic biomass primarily by removing lignin. In this study, recommended pretreatment conditions (reaction temperature, oxygen pressure, lime loading, and time) were determined for Dacotah switchgrass. Glucan and xylan overall hydrolysis yields (72 h, 15 FPU/g raw glucan) were measured for 105 different reaction conditions involving three different reactor configurations (very short term, short term, and long term).

Investigation of enzyme formulation on pretreated switchgrass.

This work studied the benefits of adding different enzyme cocktails (cellulase, xylanase, β-glucosidase) to pretreated switchgrass. Pretreatment methods included ammonia fiber expansion (AFEX), dilute-acid (DA), liquid hot water (LHW), lime, lime+ball-milling, soaking in aqueous ammonia (SAA), and sulfur dioxide (SO(2)). The compositions of the pretreated materials were analyzed and showed a strong correlation between initial xylan composition and the benefits of xylanase addition.