ENE451 Harvesting Energy from Lignocellulosic Biomass
The course will cover an introduction to lignocellulosic biomass, classification of feedstocks, cell wall biochemistry, cell wall polymers; cellulose, hemicellulose and lignin, recalcitrance of lignocellulosic biomass, recent technologies for lignocellulosic biomass pretreatment; chemical techniques (steam explosion, acid pretreatment, alkaline pretreatment, etc) and green techniques; supercritical CO2 and ionic liquid pretreatments, enzymatic hydrolysis, fermentation, production of platform chemicals from lignocellulosic biomass via catalysis in the absence or presence of ionic liquids; production of 5-hydroxymethyl furfural (HMF) from structural polysaccaharides, valorization of lignin to produce functionalized aromatics, etc. Students are expected to work in groups to carry out a research project throughout the term and present their work at the end of the term.