Pretreatment of Rice Hulls for Cellulase Production by Solid Substrate Fermentation

This research was supported by National Basic Research Program of China (973 Program) (No. 2004CB719700) and 211 Program of Tsinghua University.

Abstract

Rice hulls via pretreatment served as a solid substrate for cellulase production. Different pretreatment methods, including microwave irradiation, organosolv process catalyzed by acid or alkali were compared. With rice hulls pretreated by microwave irradiation coupled with alkaline pretreatment and rice hulls pretreated with organosolv process catalyzed with acid or alkali, the maxima of filter paper activity (FPA) obtained during the fermentation were 18%, 21%, 31% higher, and maxima of the carboxy‐methyl cellulase (CMCase) were 7.7%, 14%, 16% higher than those obtained with the rice hulls pretreated only with alkali, respectively. The ratios of cellulose degradation were also estimated and they showed similar tendency with the maxima of FPA detected in the fermentation processes.

Keywords:

• Microwave irradiation
• organosolv process
• pretreatment
• cellulase
• lignocellulose
• solid substrate fermentation

Notes

This research was supported by National Basic Research Program of China (973 Program) (No. 2004CB719700) and 211 Program of Tsinghua University.