Publications

Understanding and regulation of microbial lignolysis for renewable platform chemicals

Turner, Kevin T.; Hudson, Corey H.; Tran-Gyamfi, Mary B.; Powell, Amy J.; Williams, Kelly P.

Lignin is often overlooked in the valorization of lignocellulosic biomass, but lignin-based materials and chemicals represent potential value-added products for biorefineries that could significantly improve the economics of a biorefinery. Fluctuating crude oil prices and changing fuel specifications are some of the driving factors to develop new technologies that could be used to convert polymeric lignin into low molecular weight lignin and or monomeric aromatic feedstocks to assist in the displacement of the current products associated with the conversion of a whole barrel of oil. Our project of understanding microbial lignolysis for renewable platform chemicals aimed to understand microbial and enzymatic lignolysis processes to break down lignin for conversion into commercially viable drop-in fuels. We developed novel lignin analytics to interrogate enzymatic and microbial lignolysis of native polymeric lignin and established a detailed understanding of lignolysis as a function of fungal enzyme, microbes and endophytes. Bioinformatics pipeline was developed for metatranscryptomic analysis of aridland ecosystem for investigating the potential discovery of new lignolysis gene and gene products.