@article {47135, title = {Energy and life cycle impact assessment for xylitol production from corncob}, journal = {Journal of Cleaner Production}, volume = {278}, year = {2021}, month = {JAN }, pages = {123217}, type = {Article}, abstract = {

The conversion of biobased feedstocks into energy and value-added chemicals is one main approach to address the current global challenge for waste mitigation through the biorefinery mode. Corncob biomass which is one of the most abundant agricultural residue in India with a high hemicellulose content, can serve as a potential low-cost raw material for food-grade xylitol production. The present study demonstrates a process for xylitol production from corncob biomass with detailed energy and life cycle analysis for viability assessment. The major highlight of the process is the use of microbial fermentation, where biomass-derived D-xylose is converted to xylitol with high selectivity. Overall, 0.502 kg of xylitol crystals could be produced from 3.5 kg of corncob biomass. Simulation analysis revealed that the evaporators are the primary consumers of energy, and the process of heat integration can significantly reduce the energy requirements of the overall process. Environmental impacts of the system evaluated showed emission results of 8.68 kg CO2 equivalent and revealed that marine aquatic and freshwater eco-toxicity are the only possible contributors to the environment. The results suggest that the process would have favourable energy balances, which can be used in pilot plant and heat exchanger network design and operation for xylitol production scale up to 500 L. (C) 2020 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

}, keywords = {biomass valorization, Life cycle impact assessment, simulation, xylitol}, issn = {0959-6526}, doi = {10.1016/j.jclepro.2020.123217}, author = {Dasgupta, Diptarka and Sidana, Arushdeep and Ghosh, Prasenjit and Sharma, Tripti and Singh, Jasvinder and Prabhune, Asmita and More, Snehal and Bhaskar, Thallada and Ghosh, Debashish} } @article {48121, title = {Crystalline xylitol production from corncob biomass with oral toxicity analysis}, journal = {Industrial Crops and Products}, volume = {187}, year = {2022}, month = {NOV }, pages = {115407}, type = {Article}, abstract = {

Xylitol, a five-carbon sugar alcohol, has a steady global market and finds application as a natural sugar substitute in various food and confectionery products. Biocatalytic xylitol production, although touted as a greener alternative to conventional chemical catalysis, suffers from certain challenges, the primary being high cost of production. This study demonstrates a process for food-grade xylitol production from corncob biomass with energy reduction through two major process modifications. A non-conventional fermentation strategy was adopted whereby adjusting aeration without agitation, xylitol with high yield (0.86 +/- 0.015 g/g), and productivity (0.74 gL(-1)h(-1)) could be produced by a GRAS Pichia caribbica MTCC 5703 strain. Xylitol was recovered from the broth in the form of crystals using a combination of membrane-based filtration and crystallization. The crystals demonstrated similar to 98 \% purity when quantified with H-1 NMR. Oral toxicity analysis of the crystals demonstrated no adverse effect in female Winstar rats (at a loading of 2000 mg/kg body weight of animals). Overall process statistics showed that 0.584 kg of food-grade xylitol crystals could be produced from 3.5 kg of corncob biomass. The two-process modifications during fermentation and xylitol recovery enabled an energy saving of similar to 20.842 kW/kg of crystals, providing tremendous advantages for biorefinery-based large-scale xylitol production from corncob biomass.

}, keywords = {Biomass, Fermentation, Oral toxicity analysis, Wastewater treatment, xylitol}, issn = {0926-6690}, doi = {10.1016/j.indcrop.2022.115407}, author = {Ahuja, Vishal and Dasgupta, Diptarka and Kshirsagar, Siddheshwar and Ghosh, Prasenjit and More, Snehal and Gupta, Piyush and Behera, Babita and Bhaskar, Thallada} } @article {48104, title = {Process development for crystalline xylitol production from corncob biomass by Pichia caribbica}, journal = {Food and Bioproducts Processing}, volume = {133}, year = {2022}, month = {MAY}, pages = {45-56}, type = {Article}, abstract = {

Xylitol, a commodity chemical, is widely used in nutraceutical and pharmaceutical formulations. Microbial xylitol production is a promising alternative to mitigate current industrial practice issues and offers an environment-friendly sustainable conversion route. This study demonstrates a bioprocess for xylitol production from corncob using a mesophilic yeast Pichia caribbica. Corncob was hydrolyzed by dilute acid and steam explosion to recover fermentable xylose and used as the feed for xylitol production. Activated carbon treatment (3\% w/v) completely removed the biomass-derived inhibitors furfural and hydroxymethyl furfural from the liquid hydrolysate. The fermenting yeast Pichia caribbica produced 124.1 +/- 0.45 g/L xylitol from the detoxified and concentrated corncob hydrolysate with a high yield of 0.80 +/- 0.02 g/g. The crystallized xylitol with 96.5\% purity demonstrated no harmful effects on the cell line used as a control for the in-vitro toxicity studies. This proof of concept can be applied to help scale up for bio-refinery-based large-scale production of xylitol from corncob biomass.(c) 2022 Institution of Chemical Engineers. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

}, keywords = {Biomass, Corncob, Detoxification, Fermentation, Toxicity analysis, xylitol}, issn = {0960-3085}, doi = {10.1016/j.fbp.2022.02.006}, author = {Dasgupta, Diptarka and Sidana, Arushdeep and Sarkar, Bipul and More, Snehal and Ghosh, Debashish and Bhaskar, Thallada and Ray, Anjan} }