Swords to plowshares: Engineering plants for more biofuel sugars
Tuesday, April 2, 2013 - 05:00
in Physics & Chemistry
(Phys.org) —Xylan is a polysaccharide composed of pentoses – five carbon sugars – that represents a double-edged sword for advanced biofuels. On the one hand, as the world's second most abundant source of biomass after cellulose, xylan is an enormous source of stored solar energy. On the other hand, the presence of xylan makes it more difficult to extract the hexoses – six carbon sugars – in cellulose that are more easily fermented into biofuels than pentoses.