Abstract
The use of agro-industrial residues in biorefinery processes has been increasing due to the negative environmental impact associated with the excessive use of fossil fuels. Several residues have been evaluated as precursors for carbohydrate production, which in turn can be converted into numerous high value-added products, such as the products of the furanic series, 5-hydroxymethylfurfural and furfural. Thus, this work aimed to determine the chemical composition of passion fruit and purple yam peels in order to analyze their potential for use as raw material for biorefineries. For the determination of sugars, the shells were submitted to acid hydrolysis according to two different methodologies: one by the National Renewable Energy Laboratory method and the other by the Dunning et al. (1949) methodology. The products obtained were analyzed by Fourier Transform Infrared Spectrophotometry and High-Performance Liquid Chromatography. The results show that passion fruit and purple yam peels presented high percentages of hemicellulose (30% and 15%, respectively) and mainly of cellulose (above 44% for both shells according to the two tested methodologies). Due to the significant amount of these polysaccharides present in the biomass, they have potential for use in biorefineries.
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