Investigation of the Effective Catalyst for Organosolv Pretreatment of Liriodendron tulipifera

Abstract

Organosolv pretreatments which utilized sulfuric acid, sodium hydroxide and ammonia as catalysts were conducted to screen the effective catalyst for organosolv pretreatment of Liriodendron tulipifera. The enzymatic hydrolysis was achieved effectively with sulfuric acid (74.2%) and sodium hydroxide (63.7%). They were thus considered as effective catalysts for organosolv pretreatment of L. tulipifera. The organosolv pretreatments with sulfuric acid and sodium hydroxide showed a different behavior on the reaction mechanism. The pretreatment with sulfuric acid increased the biomass roughness and pore numbers. On the other hand, the pretreatment with sodium hydroxide enhanced the surface area due to the size reduction and minor defiberization which were caused by hemicellulose degradation at an initial stage and more defiberization by lignin degradation at a later stage. The organosolv pretreatment with sodium hydroxide was performed at several different conditions to evaluate effectiveness of sodium hydroxide as a catalyst for organosolv pretreatment. According to the results of enzymatic digestibility, the changes of chemical composition and the morphological analysis of pretreated biomass, it was suggested that the pretreatment time impacted primarily on enzymatic hydrolysis. Increase in surface area during the pretreatment was a major cause for improvement in enzymatic digestibility when sodium hydroxide was used as a catalyst.