Abstract
Lignocellulosic biomass (LB) is an abundant and renewable resource from plants mainly composed of polysaccharides (cellulose and hemicelluloses) and an aromatic polymer (lignin). LB has a high potential as an alternative to fossil resources to produce second-generation biofuels and biosourced chemicals and materials without compromising global food security. One of the major limitations to LB valorisation is its recalcitrance to enzymatic hydrolysis caused by the heterogeneous multi-scale structure of plant cell walls. Factors affecting LB recalcitrance are strongly interconnected and difficult to dissociate. They can be divided into structural factors (cellulose specific surface area, cellulose crystallinity, degree of polymerization, pore size and volume) and chemical factors (composition and content in lignin, hemicelluloses, acetyl groups). Goal of this review is to propose an up-to-date survey of the relative impact of chemical and structural factors on biomass recalcitrance and of the most advanced techniques to evaluate these factors. Also, recent spectral and water-related measurements accurately predicting hydrolysis are presented. Overall, combination of relevant factors and specific measurements gathering simultaneously structural and chemical information should help to develop robust and efficient LB conversion processes into bioproducts.
Highlights
The environment is suffering from climate change, worsened by over-exploitation of resources increasing global greenhouse gas emission (Anderson et al, 2019; Hassan et al, 2019)
The integration of large amount of data by the means of machine learning approaches should help devising more complex models predicting composition and dynamical behavior of Lignocellulosic biomass (LB) over transformation such as hydrolysis. In this context, imaging and quantification of structural features at the cellular/tissular scale or at nano-scale might be relevant paths to follow
In this context, imaging and quantification of structural features at the cellular/tissular scale (by fluorescence confocal microscopy based on previous reports studying for example plant morphogenesis) or at nano-scale (by atomic force microscopy) might be relevant paths to follow
Summary
The environment is suffering from climate change, worsened by over-exploitation of resources increasing global greenhouse gas emission (Anderson et al, 2019; Hassan et al, 2019). Lignocellulosic biomass (LB) continues to attract global interest as a sustainable alternative to fossil carbon resources to produce second-generation biofuels and other biobased chemicals without compromising global food security (Menon and Rao, 2012; Chandel et al, 2018). These include agricultural wastes such as cereal straw (Yuan et al, 2018) and bagasse (Dias et al, 2009), forest residues such as pine (Cotana et al, 2014) and dedicated crops and short rotation coppices such as miscanthus (Lewandowski et al, 2000), switchgrass (Schmer et al, 2008), and poplar (Sannigrahi et al, 2010). They can be divided into structural factors, which mainly refer
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