Novel cellulose structure to lower feedstock costs

Researchers from Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL) and the Great Lakes Bioenergy Research Center (GLBRC) are investigating the unique properties of crystalline cellulose nanofibers to develop novel chemical pretreatments and designer enzymes for biofuel production from cellulosic—or non-food—plant derived biomass.Novel biomass pretreatments can convert cellulose to a unique crystalline structure called cellulose III that reduces native enzyme binding while increasing sugar yields by as much as five times.