title: Effect of alkaline pre-treatment on enzyme synergy for efficient hemicellulose hydrolysis in sugarcane bagasse.
abstract: This aim of this study was to investigate the effect of ammonium hydroxide (NH(4)OH) and sodium hydroxide (NaOH) pre-treatment on the digestibility of sugarcane bagasse (SCB) by hemicellulase action. It was found that pre-treatment of SCB with NH(4)OH removed a larger percentage of the SCB lignin and effectively increased SCB digestibility 13.13 fold. The greatest amount of reducing sugar (1194.88 μmol/min) and largest degree of synergy (2.85) was obtained using a combination of two enzymes (25% ManA and 75% XynA) with NH(4)OH pre-treated SCB. In this study, NH(4)OH therefore appeared to be a more effective pre-treatment step for subsequent hydrolysis by hemicellulases.
authors.affiliation: Department of Biochemistry, Microbiology and Biotechnology, Rhodes University, Grahamstown 6140, South Africa.
authors.forename: Natasha
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Beukes
authors.forename: Brett I
authors.initials: BI
authors.lastname: Pletschke
mesh_terms: D002482:Cellulose / Q000378:metabolism*; D006026:Glycoside Hydrolases / Q000737:chemistry*; D006868:Hydrolysis; D011134:Polysaccharides / Q000737:chemistry*; D011994:Recombinant Proteins / Q000737:chemistry; D031786:Saccharum / Q000737:chemistry*
chemical_list: D011134:Polysaccharides; D011994:Recombinant Proteins; C007916:hemicellulose; D002482:Cellulose; C027433:bagasse; D006026:Glycoside Hydrolases; C023305:hemicellulase