November 02, 2015 - Bioenergy researchers at Oak Ridge National Laboratory have explained the molecular mechanism of an effect that has puzzled scientists for years. A team led by Jeremy Smith has discovered that lignin, when pretreated with a tetrahydrofuran-water solvent, shifts from a globule to an extended coil, providing unrestricted access of enzymes to cellulose. Past experimental studies have shown that chemical pretreatments with this mixture is highly effective at extracting lignin from biomass and achieving high yields of fermentable sugars from cellulose, but until now, researchers have not known why. By simulating biomass systems on the Titan supercomputer, scientist are getting closer to defeating lignin, one of the biggest barriers to efficient transformation of biomass into biofuel and bioproducts.
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