Abstract
Economic production of ethanol from plant biomass could be significantly increased if the feedstock for the fermentation is more completely utilized. Currently, simple sugars (mostly D-glucose and D-xylose) can be recovered from lignocellulose by enzymatic or acid hydrolysis. However, while glucose can be readily converted to ethanol by yeasts, the xylose is not fermentable by many of the same species of yeasts that are able to convert glucose into ethanol. Nevertheless, xylose can be converted to its ketose isomer, xylulose, by the enzyme xylose isomerase and this isomer can be converted to ethanol. A major obstacle, however, in converting the xylose to xylulose and then simultaneously converting the xylulose to ethanol is that the pH at which xylose isomerase displays its optimal activity (pH of 7.0-8.0) is much different from the pH at which the fermentation of the xylulose and glucose is best carried out (pH of 4.0-5.0). Herein we propose a novel scheme to provide a means by which the isomerization an...
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