Optimal conditions for pretreatment of rice straw with n-butylamine for enzymatic solubilization

Summary Three different pretreatment methods with n-butylamine (n-BA) were used to obtain fermentable sugars in a high yield from rice straw. The optimal conditions of each method were as follows: treating at boiling point for 1 h under refluxing in 10 w/w% n-BA with the weight ratio of n-BA to original rice straw more than 1.0, autoclaving at 120°C for 1 h in 1 w/w% n-BA with the weight ratio more than 0.1, and wetting for 2 h with the circulating condensate of the vapour evaporated from 2.5 w/w% n-BA with the weight ratio more than 0.8. Soaking rice straw with n-BA before the above pretreatments was not needed. For the circulation pretreatment, the overall cumulative yield of total sugars (70% of cellulose and hemicellulose in original rice straw) was best for both pretreatment and enzymatic solubilization steps, because there was no decomposition of monosaccharides during the pretreatment. Furthermore, the optimal degree of delignification for enzymatic solubilization of the pretreated rice straw was approximately 60% of lignin in the original.