Effect of alkaline pre-treatment on enzyme synergy for efficient hemicellulose hydrolysis in sugarcane bagasse

This aim of this study was to investigate the effect of ammonium hydroxide (NH₄OH) and sodium hydroxide (NaOH) pre-treatment on the digestibility of sugarcane bagasse (SCB) by hemicellulase action. It was found that pre-treatment of SCB with NH₄OH removed a larger percentage of the SCB lignin and effectively increased SCB digestibility 13.13 fold. The greatest amount of reducing sugar (1194.88 μmol/min) and largest degree of synergy (2.85) was obtained using a combination of two enzymes (25% ManA and 75% XynA) with NH₄OH pre-treated SCB. In this study, NH₄OH therefore appeared to be a more effective pre-treatment step for subsequent hydrolysis by hemicellulases.