Producing Fuels and Chemicals from Lignocellulosic Biomass by a Novel Hybrid Conversion Platform

Conversion of lignocellulosic biomass into biofuels and chemicals can be achieved through a hybrid process which combines thermochemical technologies to fractionate biomass into different substrates and biochemical processing to convert the substrates into useful products. Based on the thermochemical processes used, the hybrid process can be divided into gasification-syngas fermentation, and pyrolysis-bio oil fermentation processes. In this work, we reported the most recent research on the syngas fermentation and bio-oil fermentation. In syngas fermentation, novel biofilm-based reactors were developed for enhancing the mass transfer efficiencies of the syngas (CO+H-2). The bacteria Clostridium carboxidivorans strain P7 produced a higher titer of the ethanol than conventional CSTR fermenters. In bio-oil fermentation, the chlamydomonas reinhardtii was used for utilizing acetic acid, a major compound in the bio-oil, through heterotrophic culture; the research effort focusing on adapting the microalgae for the toxic compounds in the bio-oil through metabolic evolution.