Increased Cellulosic Ethanol Productivity Through Enzyme Recycling and Yeast Cells Reuse
Executive Summary Cellulosic ethanol is produced from non-food based feedstock such as corn stover, the leaves and stalks of corn. This feedstock contains lignocellulose (cellulose, hemicellulose, and lignin), which must be hydrolyzed to release sugars, which are converted to ethanol. Three major issues impeding commercial production of cellulosic ethanol are high enzyme loading requirements, slow xylose fermentation, and low ethanol production. Researchers at MSU have developed a novel process that overcomes these production issues by recycling enzymes and reusing yeast cells. This reduces production costs and increases physical plant output significantly. Description of Technology A novel process has been developed that overcomes all three problems with pre-processing of cellulosic biomass. With this process, the lignocellulosic biomass is hydrolyzed in less than 24 hours. The easily hydrolyzed part of the biomass is converted to fermentable sugars. This fast hydrolysate is removed from the solids and fermented to ethanol. Meanwhile, the unhydrolyzed recalcitrant solids (with bound enzymes) are cycled through subsequent hydrolysis cycles. Thus, easily digestible biomass is processed and removed for production of ethanol, while recalcitrant biomass is given more time to hydrolyze. Recycling unhydrolyzed enzymes bound to the solids reduces enzyme input costs. In addition, after fermentation, yeast cells are also recycled, further reducing costs. With this process, cellulosic ethanol plant output is increased 2 to 3 fold. Key BenefitsLower production costs as a result of reduced enzyme loadingLess feedstock waste due to increased output efficiencyIncreased production rateReduced capital investments since fewer fermenters are requiredAbundant availability of non-food based feedstocks ApplicationsProduction of biofuelLignin production (useful in carbon fiber production) Patent Status Patent application published US 20140227757 Licensing Rights Available Full licensing rights available Inventors: Dr. Venkatesh Balan, Dr. Bruce Dale, Mingjie Jin Tech ID: TEC2012-0035 and TEC2016-0018 Learn more about the Great Lakes Bioenergy Research Center (GLBRC) at MSU
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