Glucaric Acid Production from Miscanthus sacchariflorus via TEMPO-Mediated Oxidation with an Efficient Separation System.

In this study, production and isolation of glucaric acid from lignocellulosic biomass were performed via potassium cation-based TEMPO-mediated oxidation for the ease of glucaric acid isolation. To optimize the oxidation conditions, response surface methodology (RSM) was adopted using standard glucose as the raw material. Among the oxidation conditions, the dosage of oxidant and pH of reaction affected the glucaric acid production, and the optimum conditions were suggested by RSM analysis: 5 °C of reaction temperature, 4.23 equiv dosage of KClO per mole of glucose, and pH of 12. Furthermore, glucaric acid was produced from lignocellulosic biomass-derived enzymatic hydrolysate from Miscanthus under optimum conditions. The impurities such as xylose and lignin in enzymatic hydrolysate inhibited the efficiency of glucose oxidation. As a result, more oxidant was required to produce sufficient glucaric acid from the enzymatic hydrolysate compared to standard glucose. The produced glucaric acid was simply isolated by controlling the pH in the form of glucaric acid monopotassium salt, which showed lower solubility in water, and the purity of isolated glucaric acid was over 99%. The overall mass balance of feedstock to glucaric acid was analyzed, suggesting that 86.38% (w/w) glucaric acid could be produced from initial glucan in feedstock.

Ethanol organosolv lignin as a substitute for commercial antioxidants, focusing on the structural properties and synergistic effect with myricetin.

Lignin has potential as a substitute for natural antioxidants in cosmetics and food industries due to its radical scavenging ability and price competitiveness. The antioxidant activity of lignin depends on its structural properties, and they accordingly have synergy with natural antioxidants. Based on the structural characteristics, the antioxidant activity of ethanol organosolv lignin (EOL) and synergy with myricetin were investigated. The phenolic-OH content was a predominant factor in the antioxidant activity of EOL, and EOL-H with a higher phenolic-OH content and lower IC50 value (0.17 mg/mL) covered a wide synergy range of 1:32-2:1 (EOL:myricetin). The synergistic effect was verified by comparing predicted and actual values based on ESR analysis, and the phenolic-OH ratio (>0.4) of myricetin and EOL for the synergy was suggested. In this respect, the results highlight the potential of lignin with high phenolic-OH content as a substitute for commercial antioxidants with superior activity and broad synergy ranges.