Fungal pretreatment of cornstalk with Phanerochaete chrysosporium for enhancing enzymatic saccharification and hydrogen production

The feasibility of fungal pretreatment of cornstalk with Phanerochaete chrysosporium for enzymatic saccharification and H2 production was investigated in this study. Firstly, cornstalk was pretreated with P. chrysosporium at 29 °C under static condition for 15 d, lignin reduction was up to 34.3% with holocellulose loss less than 10%. Microscopic structure observation combined FTIR analysis further demonstrated that the lignin and crystallinity were decreased. Subsequently, the fungal-pretreated cornstalk was subjected to enzymatic hydrolysis by the crude cellulase from Trichoderma viride to produce fermentable sugars which were then fermented to bio-H2 using Thermoanaerobacterium thermosaccharolyticum W16. The maximum enzymatic saccharification was found to be 47.3% which was 20.3% higher than the control without pretreatment. Upon fermentation of enzymatic hydrolysate, the yield of H2 was calculated to be 80.3 ml/g-pretreated cornstalk. The present results suggested the potential of using hydrogen-producing bacteria for high-yield conversion of cornstalk into bio-H2 integrate with biological pretreatment and enzymatic saccharification.