Effect of Converge Mill Grinding on the Enzymatic Saccharification Characteristics of Woody Materials

Abstract

The effect of the grinding of raw Japanese cedar chip as a model material of woody materials by a new type ball mill, namely converge mill, was studied for the effective enzymatic saccharification. We achieved almost 100% of saccharification degree from ground cedar powder prepared by the converge mill. The grinding time of the converge mill was shorter than that of a conventional tumbling mill. We found that the crystallinity index was more important factor than the mean diameter on the saccharification degree, indicating that the breaking of the micro fiblril structure of cellulose is more essential than the downsizing of the bulk particle. We also studied the effect of media ball types of the converge mill and found that chromium steel ball was more effective to obtain high saccharification degree than SUS 304 and stabilized zirconia balls. We investigated an optimum grinding condition for the converge mill and found that higher rotation speed, lower amount of reactant charge, higher amount of media ball charge, and smaller size of media ball were optimum conditions for the saccharification. It was concluded that the grinding of Japanese cedar by the converge mill was an effective pretreatment to achieve high efficient enzymatic saccharification.