Saccharifying biomass

Patent metadata

Field	Value
Publication number	US-9957580-B2
Application number	US-201414498144-A
Country	US
Kind code	B2
Filing date	Sep 26, 2014
Priority date	Feb 11, 2009
Publication date	May 1, 2018
Grant date	May 1, 2018

Abstract

Biomass feedstocks (e.g., plant biomass, animal biomass, and municipal waste biomass) are processed to produce useful products, such as fuels. For example, systems are described that can convert feedstock materials to a sugar solution, which can then be fermented to produce ethanol.

First claim

What is claimed is:

1. A method comprising:
pretreating a cellulosic or lignocellulosic material with ionizing radiation at a dose between 0.25 Mrad and 10 Mrad to increase the brittleness of the cellulosic or lignocellulosic material and mechanically treating the ionized cellulosic or lignocellulosic material in the dry state to obtain fibers having a diameter in the range of 5 μm to 50 μm;
enzymatically hydrolyzing the radiated cellulosic or lignocellulosic material to obtain a saccharification mixture comprising sugars; and
concentrating the saccharification mixture comprising sugars to provide a concentrate, wherein the sugar content of the concentrate comprises from about 10 to about 70 percent by weight glucose and from about 2 to about 35 percent by weight xylose.

2. The method of claim 1 , wherein the concentrate comprises from about 15 to about 65 percent by weight glucose and from about 2 to about 30 percent by weight xylose.

3. The method of claim 1 or 2 in which the concentrate has a total sugar concentration of from about 15 to about 85 weight percent by weight.

4. The method of claim 3 , wherein the total sugar concentration is from about 20 to about 75 percent by weight.

5. The method of claim 1 , in which the concentrate further comprising water.

6. The method of claim 1 , wherein the cellulosic or lignocellulosic comprises corn cobs.

Assignees

• Xyleco Inc

Inventors

• Medoff Marshall
• Masterman Thomas Craig

Classifications

• C12P7/10

  substrate containing cellulosic material · CPC title

• C13K13/00

  Sugars not otherwise provided for in this class · CPC title

• C13K13/002

  Xylose · CPC title

• C13K1/02 Primary

  obtained by saccharification of cellulosic materials (manufacture of fodder A23K10/32) · CPC title

• C12P2201/00

  Pretreatment of cellulosic or lignocellulosic material for subsequent enzymatic treatment or hydrolysis · CPC title