This paper reviews pretreatment techniques to enhance the anaerobic digestion of organic solid waste, including mechanical, thermal, chemical and biological methods. The effects of various pretreatment methods are discussed independently and in combination. Pretreatment methods are compared in terms of their efficiency, energy balance, environmental sustainability as well as capital, operationa...

A pretreatment of lignocellulosic biomass to produce biofuels, polymers, and other chemicals plays a vital role in the biochemical conversion process toward disrupting the closely associated structures of the cellulose-hemicellulose-lignin molecules. Various pretreatment steps alter the chemical/physical structure of lignocellulosic materials by solubilizing hemicellulose and/or lignin, decreas...

Overcoming the recalcitrance (resistance of plant cell walls to deconstruction) of lignocellulosic biomass is a key step in the production of fuels and chemicals. The recalcitrance is due to the highly crystalline structure of cellulose which is embedded in a matrix of polymers-lignin and hemicellulose. The main goal of pretreatment is to overcome this recalcitrance, to separate the cellulose f...

In this study, Populus trichocarpa was subjected to dilute acid pretreatment at varying pretreatment times. The three major components of lignocellulosic biomass, namely cellulose, hemicellulose and lignin, were isolated from the starting and dilute acid pretreated poplar. Gel permeation chromatography (GPC) and nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) techniques were utilized to elucidate structural t...

BACKGROUND The recalcitrance of lignocellulosic biomass is a major limitation for its conversion into biofuels by enzymatic hydrolysis. The use of a pretreatment technology is an essential step to diminish biomass recalcitrance for bioethanol production. In this study, a two-step pretreatment using hydrothermal pretreatment at various temperatures and alkali fractionation was performed on eucal...