Corn stover has potential for economical production of biofuels and value-added chemicals. The conversion of corn stover to sugars involves pretreatment and enzymatic hydrolysis. We have optimized hydrothermal, dilute H2SO4 and dilute H3PO4 pretreatments of corn stover for enzymatic saccharification and fermentation to fuel ethanol by a recombinant bacterium in which the production of fermentation inhibitors such as furfural and hydroxymethyl furfural were minimized so that there was no need for detoxification of the hydrolyzates. Also we have developed a method for efficient production of furfural, an important chemical used in several industries. Furfural is the degradation product of pentose sugars produced from the hemicellulosic fraction of biomass during typical H2SO4 pretreatment at high temperature. We have optimized the pretreatment conditions using dilute H3PO4 for maximum furfural production from corn stover. The solid residue containing cellulose fraction was converted to ethanol by Saccharomyces cerevisiae after enzymatic hydrolysis.

Production of ethanol and furfural from corn stover

245th National Meeting (2013)

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