Microwave-assisted alkaline delignification of banana peduncle

Banana peduncle is a cellulose-rich biomass with awide range of potential in various industry. In this work, mild microwave irradiation was employed with alkaline assistance for pretreatment of the banana peduncle. Compositional analysis was studied at various NaOH concentrations at 121oC for 30min with and without the microwave irradiation. Under these conditions, microwave-assisted alkaline pre-treated samples showed 60.86% delignification at 6.25N NaOH and alkaline pre-treated showed 48.63% delignification at 7.5N NaOH. Crystalline index for untreated, alkaline pre-treated, and microwave-assisted alkaline pre-treated are 34.56%, 50%, and 5.20%, respectively. Microwave-assisted alkaline treatment increased surface exposure in terms of surface area by 98.70%, pore volume by two-fold, and pore diameter by 15.9%.