Article

Engineering of a high-throughput screening system to identify cellulosic biomass, pretreatments, and enzyme formulations that enhance sugar release

  1. Michael H. Studer,
  2. Jaclyn D. DeMartini,
  3. Simone Brethauer,
  4. Heather L. McKenzie,
  5. Charles E. Wyman*

Article first published online: 3 SEP 2009

DOI: 10.1002/bit.22527

Issue

Biotechnology and Bioengineering

Biotechnology and Bioengineering

Volume 105, Issue 2, pages 231–238, 1 February 2010

Additional Information

How to Cite

Studer, M. H., DeMartini, J. D., Brethauer, S., McKenzie, H. L. and Wyman, C. E. (2010), Engineering of a high-throughput screening system to identify cellulosic biomass, pretreatments, and enzyme formulations that enhance sugar release. Biotechnol. Bioeng., 105: 231–238. doi: 10.1002/bit.22527

Author Information

  1. Chemical and Environmental Engineering Department, Center for Environmental Research and Technology, Bourns College of Engineering, University of California Riverside, 1084 Columbia Avenue, Riverside, California 92507; telephone: +951-781-5791; fax: +951-781-5790

*Chemical and Environmental Engineering Department, Center for Environmental Research and Technology, Bourns College of Engineering, University of California Riverside, 1084 Columbia Avenue, Riverside, California 92507; telephone: +951-781-5791; fax: +951-781-5790.

Publication History

  1. Issue published online: 21 DEC 2009
  2. Article first published online: 3 SEP 2009
  3. Accepted manuscript online: 3 SEP 2009 12:00AM EST
  4. Manuscript Accepted: 31 AUG 2009
  5. Manuscript Revised: 21 AUG 2009
  6. Manuscript Received: 7 APR 2009

Funded by

  • Office of Biological and Environmental Research in the DOE
  • Office of Science for the BioEnergy Science Center (BESC)

SEARCH

SEARCH BY CITATION

ARTICLE TOOLS

Get PDF (262K)

Keywords:

  • co-hydrolysis;
  • enzymatic hydrolysis;
  • high throughput;
  • multiwell plate;
  • pretreatment

Abstract

The recalcitrance of cellulosic biomass, the only abundant, sustainable feedstock for making liquid fuels, is a primary obstacle to low cost biological processing, and development of more easily converted plants and more effective enzymes would be of great benefit. Because no single parameter describes recalcitrance, superior variants can only be identified by measuring sugar release from plants subjected to pretreatment and enzymatic hydrolysis. However, genetic modifications of plants coupled with molecular engineering of deconstruction proteins and definition of pretreatment conditions create a very large sample set, and previous methods for biomass pretreatment at elevated temperatures and pressures prevented use of a fully integrated high-throughput (HTP) screening pipeline. Herein, we report on the engineering of a novel HTP pretreatment system employing a 96 well-plate format that withstands extreme pretreatment conditions for rapid screening of biomass–enzyme-pretreatment combinations. This includes the development of new approaches to steam heating and water quenching the system that result in much faster heat up and cool down than previously possible and show consistent temperature histories across the multiwell plate. Coupled pretreatment and enzymatic hydrolysis performance of the well plate pretreatment system is shown to be consistent among the many wells in the device and also with performance of conventional tubular reactors. Biotechnol. Bioeng. 2010; 105: 231–238. © 2009 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

Get PDF (262K)