For the conversion of plant biomass into various bioproducts, a significant bottleneck is enzymatic hydrolysis of lignocelluloses to soluble sugars. These sugars are then metabolized through various natural or engineered pathways toward products of interest. The success of projected biorefinery processes depend to a large extent on the economics of hydrolytic enzyme production. Presently, mesop...

BACKGROUND Pretreatment of lignocellulose for biochemical conversion commonly results in formation of by-products that inhibit microorganisms and cellulolytic enzymes. To make bioconversion processes more efficient, inhibition problems can be alleviated through conditioning. Ozone is currently commercially employed in pulp and paper production for bleaching, as it offers the desirable capabilit...

Several ruminal cellulolytic bacteria species are sensitive to pH and could therefore be used as biomarkers to determine the risk of sub-acute ruminal acidosis (SARA) in finishing lambs. This study compared a 2-4 h post feeding ruminal pH measurement to abundances of the ruminal pH-sensitive bacteria to evaluate the risk of SARA in a herd of 120 finishing lambs. The lambs were reared in individ...

Specific cellulose hydrolysis rates (g of cellulose/g of cellulase per h) were shown to be substantially higher (2.7- to 4.7-fold) for growing cultures of Clostridium thermocellum as compared with purified cellulase preparations from this organism in controlled experiments involving both batch and continuous cultures. This "enzyme-microbe synergy" requires the presence of metabolically active c...

Cellulolytic fungi can easily be screened within 2 d for the production of cellulolytic enzymes by staining with Congo red, or by measuring the amount of reducing sugar (glucose) produced with the dinitrosalicyclic acid reagent method. Endoglucanase activity is visible in carboxymethyl cellulose agar plates after staining with Congo red, and fixing with HCI or NaOH. This method is essentially b...

To obtain basic information on the detection of cellulolytic activity in Auricularia auricula-judae, the influences of dye reagent, pH, and temperature were assessed. Chromogenic dye (congo red, phenol red, remazol brilliant blue, and trypan blue) was individually incorporated into a medium containing either carboxymethyl-cellulose, Avicel, or D-cellobiose as a polysaccharide carbon substrate. ...