Abstract ▼ AI-Helper

Biological conversion of biomass into fuels and chemicals requires hydrolysis of the polysaccharide fraction into monomeric sugars. Hydrolysis can be performed enzymatically, and with dilute or concentrate mineral acids. In this study, dilute sulfuric acid used as a catalyst for the hydrolysis of ra...

Biological conversion of biomass into fuels and chemicals requires hydrolysis of the polysaccharide fraction into monomeric sugars. Hydrolysis can be performed enzymatically, and with dilute or concentrate mineral acids. In this study, dilute sulfuric acid used as a catalyst for the hydrolysis of rapeseed straw. The purpose of this study is to optimize the hydrolysis process in a 15ml bomb tube reactor and investigate the effects of the acid concentration, temperature and reaction time on the hemicellulose removal and consequently on the production of sugars (xylose, glucose and arabinose) as well as on the formation of by-products (furfural, 5-hydroxymethylfurfural and acetic acid). Statistical analysis was based on a model composition corresponding to a $3^3$ orthogonal factorial design and employed the response surface methodology (RSM) to optimize the hydrolysis conditions, aiming to attain maximum xylose extraction from hemicellulose of rapeseed straw. The obtained optimum conditions were: acid concentration of 0.77%, temperature of $164^{\circ}C$ with a reaction time of 18min. Under these conditions, 75.94% of the total xylose was removed and the hydrolysate contained 0.65g $L^{-1}$ Glucose, 0.36g $L^{-1}$ Arabinose, 3.59g $L^{-1}$ Xylose, 0.51g $L^{-1}$ Furfural, 1.36g $L^{-1}$ Acetic acid, and 0.08g $L^{-1}$ 5-hydroxymethylfurfural.