Feasibility Study on Applications of Fermented Tea Extracts for Bioenergy and Biorefinery

Abstract

As known, tea contained abundant antioxidant compositions significant to human health due to major components of polyphenols and Flavonoids. Prior studies indicated that -OH substituent-rich aromatic compounds could might have electron shuttling capabilities for bioenergy recycling. Thus, it was suspected that antioxidant compositions would be crucial to bioelectrochemical characteristics to be expressed. Prior studies also revealed that decolorized intermediates evidently could enhance redox-mediating capabilities. Thus, it was suggested that such capabilities should be strongly associated to antioxidant and electron-transfer characteristics. For sustainable development, using naturally-present/generated and environmentally compatible plants as precursor(s) for further applications of recycling and reuses is more ecologically appropriate. Thus, this feasibility study tended to use myriads of fermented tea extracts for comparative study of bio-electrochemistry. Meanwhile, exploration of contents of antioxidants could provide further perspectives for applications in biofuel cells and functional foods. The findings also suggested that highly fermented tea extract would exhibit less electron-shuttling capabilities due to less content of polyphenolics remained in tea residues. In fact, this result was in parallel with the capabilities of antioxidants as revealed in literature. This findings could be used for diverse applications in bioenergy and biorefinery.