Journal of Biotechnology & Biomaterials
Open Access

Abstract

It is predicted that the world population will be increased to 9 billion by 2050. Therefore, the next energy goals of the 21st century must be to provide reasonable energy services for the comfort of all human beings. Among all sources of energies, renewable energies are anticipated to change the future of energy flows. Each year, half of the produced world biomass is lignocellulosic biomass, which has a weight of around 10-20 billion dry tons. While lignin can be efficiently used in pharma and food sectors, it is burnt to produce heat and recover pulping chemicals in paper mills industry. In this study, high purified lignin was extracted by organosolv method from wheat straw. During the extraction process, no catalysts were applied; therefore, the carbohydrates impurities caused by acids were the least. On the other hand, all the ethanol applied in the process was recovered. So, the extraction was done with the minimum amount of solvent and energy. The extracted lignin was characterized by NMR, and FTIR. Moreover, the extraction was done in the bigger facility (20 L Parr reactor) for mass production. Furthermore, the biodegradation of lignin by Bjerkandera adusta was investigated. In the FTIR spectrum, existence of different lignin bonds including C-C, C=O, C=C, and aromatic rings were confirmed. Same groups were observed in the C-NMR spectrum. Also, the presence of carboxylic acid, aldehyde, phenolic hydroxyl, aromatic rings syringyl, and guaiacyl units were determined. The growth of Bjerkandera adusta on PDA culture media consists of 2% extracted lignin, making this fungus a good candidate for lignin biodegradation. These characteristics give the wheat straw lignin a good scope to be applied as a renewable polymer. nasim.ramezani@mail.utoronto.ca

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