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Pretreatment - highlights from the NSERC Bioconversion Network Pretreatment Workshop

Edited by Dr Linoj Kumar and Prof Jack Saddler

This special issue of Biotechnology for Biofuels focuses on pretreatment. It features selected results and conclusions from the NSERC Bioconversion Network Pretreatment Workshop, from world renowned international experts in biomass pretreatment technologies, pretreatment equipment manufacturers, pulp and paper, biotechnology and many other companies and end users.

This collection of articles has not been sponsored and articles have undergone the journal’s standard peer-review process. The Guest Editors declare no competing interests.

Submissions to this series are now closed.

  1. Forest residues represent an abundant and sustainable source of biomass which could be used as a biorefinery feedstock. Due to the heterogeneity of forest residues, such as hog fuel and bark, one of the expect...

    Authors: Sabrina Burkhardt, Linoj Kumar, Richard Chandra and Jack Saddler
    Citation: Biotechnology for Biofuels 2013 6:90
    Content type: Research Published on:

  2. Delignification pretreatments of biomass and methods to assess their efficacy are crucial for biomass-to-biofuels research and technology. Here, we applied confocal and fluorescence lifetime imaging microscopy...

    Authors: Vitor Carlos Coletta, Camila Alves Rezende, Fernando Rodrigues da Conceição, Igor Polikarpov and Francisco Eduardo Gontijo Guimarães
    Citation: Biotechnology for Biofuels 2013 6:43
    Content type: Research Published on:

  3. It is widely believed that reducing the lignocellulosic biomass particle size would improve the biomass digestibility by increasing the total surface area and eliminating mass and heat transfer limitation duri...

    Authors: Shuhaida Harun, Venkatesh Balan, Mohd Sobri Takriff, Osman Hassan, Jamaliah Jahim and Bruce E Dale
    Citation: Biotechnology for Biofuels 2013 6:40
    Content type: Research Published on:

  4. A substantial barrier to commercialization of lignocellulosic ethanol production is a lack of process specific sensors and associated control strategies that are essential for economic viability. Current senso...

    Authors: Shannon M Ewanick, Wesley J Thompson, Brian J Marquardt and Renata Bura
    Citation: Biotechnology for Biofuels 2013 6:28
    Content type: Research Published on:

  6. Bioconversion of lignocellulose by microbial fermentation is typically preceded by an acidic thermochemical pretreatment step designed to facilitate enzymatic hydrolysis of cellulose. Substances formed during ...

    Authors: Leif J Jönsson, Björn Alriksson and Nils-Olof Nilvebrant
    Citation: Biotechnology for Biofuels 2013 6:16
    Content type: Review Published on:

  7. The production of cellulosic ethanol from biomass is considered a promising alternative to reliance on diminishing supplies of fossil fuels, providing a sustainable option for fuels production in an environmen...

    Authors: Yunqiao Pu, Fan Hu, Fang Huang, Brian H Davison and Arthur J Ragauskas
    Citation: Biotechnology for Biofuels 2013 6:15
    Content type: Review Published on:

  8. Lignin is often overlooked in the valorization of lignocellulosic biomass, but lignin-based materials and chemicals represent potential value-added products for biorefineries that could significantly improve t...

    Authors: Patanjali Varanasi, Priyanka Singh, Manfred Auer, Paul D Adams, Blake A Simmons and Seema Singh
    Citation: Biotechnology for Biofuels 2013 6:14
    Content type: Research Published on:

  9. Despite decades of work and billions of dollars of investments in laboratory and pilot plant projects, commercial production of cellulosic ethanol is only now beginning to emerge. Because of: (1)high technical...

    Authors: Richard B Phillips, Hasan Jameel and Hou Min Chang
    Citation: Biotechnology for Biofuels 2013 6:13
    Content type: Research Published on:

  11. Lignocellulosic biomass, such as corn stover, is a potential raw material for ethanol production. One step in the process of producing ethanol from lignocellulose is enzymatic hydrolysis, which produces fermen...

    Authors: Pia-Maria Bondesson, Mats Galbe and Guido Zacchi
    Citation: Biotechnology for Biofuels 2013 6:11
    Content type: Research Published on:

  12. Woody biomass is one of the most abundant biomass feedstocks, besides agriculture residuals in the United States. The sustainable harvest residuals and thinnings alone are estimated at about 75 million tons/ye...

    Authors: Johnway Gao, Dwight Anderson and Benjamin Levie
    Citation: Biotechnology for Biofuels 2013 6:10
    Content type: Research Published on:

  14. Previous research on alkaline pretreatment has mainly focused on optimization of the process parameters to improve substrate digestibility. To achieve satisfactory sugar yield, extremely high chemical loading ...

    Authors: Ye Chen, Mark A Stevens, Yongming Zhu, Jason Holmes and Hui Xu
    Citation: Biotechnology for Biofuels 2013 6:8
    Content type: Research Published on:

  15. Corn cob residue (CCR) is a kind of waste lignocellulosic material with enormous potential for bioethanol production. The moderated sulphite processes were used to enhance the hydrophily of the material by sul...

    Authors: Lingxi Bu, Yang Xing, Hailong Yu, Yuxia Gao and Jianxin Jiang
    Citation: Biotechnology for Biofuels 2012 5:87
    Content type: Research Published on: