Hemicellulose processing

Fig. 3. The changes in coniferous hemicellulose as a result of pulping processes and before bleaching.

Lu and Pizzi [83] showed that lignocellulosic substrates have a distinct influence on the hardening behavior of PF-resins, whereby the activation energy of the hardening process is much lower than for the resin alone [84]. The reason is a catalytic activation of the PF-condensation by carbohydrates like crystalline and amorphous cellulose and hemicellulose. Covalent bonding between the PF-resin and the wood, especially lignin, does not play any role [84]. 

Consid - the Kraft pulping process shown in Fig. 8.8 (Dunn and El-Halwa, 1993). The first step in the process is digestion in which wood chips, containing primarily lignin, cellulose, and hemicellulose, are cooked" in white liquor (NaOH, Na2S, Na2C03 and... 

The rheological behavior of xylans has rarely been investigated [4,114,115]. The water-insoluble hemicellulose from the viscose process (containing > 85% xylan) was reported to form thixotropic aqueous dispersions of high... 

Each fruit has specific quantities and ratio of pectin, hemicelluloses and cellulose. These polysaccharides are important concerning enzymes activities required to produce juices and concentrates. Moreover, even if molecular weight and methylation degree of the pectin are specific for each fruit, during the fruit maturation, endogenous pectinases depolymerases and esterase are changing the pectin characteristics This broad variability of raw material makes difficult the standardisation of fruits processing. 

Since many years, pectolytic enzymes have been widely used in industrial beverage processing to improve either the quality and the yields in fruit juice extraction or the characteristics of the final product [1,2]. To this purpose, complex enzymatic mixtures, containing several pectolytic enzymes and often also cellulose, hemicellulose and ligninolytic activities, are usually employed in the free form. The interactions among enzymes, substrates and other components of fruit juice make the system very difficult to be investigated and only few publications are devoted to the study of enzymatic pools [3-5], An effective alternative way to carry out the depectinisation process is represented by the use of immobilized enzymes. This approach allows for a facile and efficient enzymatic reaction control to be achieved. In fact, it is possible to avoid or at least to reduce the level of extraneous substances originating from the raw pectinases in the final product. In addition, continuous processes can be set up. 

Influence of Metal Ions on Oxygen Chemisorption and Ignition of Chars. We have carried out extensive studies of the influence of metal ions in wood on pyrolysis mechanisms (5.6) and this approach has now been extended to oxygen chemisorption of the chars. The metal ions occur in wood predominantly as the counterions of the uronic acid components of the hemicelluloses (12). We have shown that they can be almost completely removed by very mild acid treatment without any other major change in the chemistry of the wood. Table II shows that the major metal ions in cottonwood are Ca, K and Mg. The acid-washing process removed 98X of the metal ions in... 

In general, these chemical treatments reduce the percentage of lignin, hemicellulose and extractives and increase that of cellulose. The chemistry of these processes is discussed more fully in Chapter... 

Pulping process Tree species Cellulose (%) Hemicellulose (%) Lignin (%) Extractives (%) ... 

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