Xylan furfural from

Relatively pure xylan isolated from the holocellulose of aspen (Populus) wood is said to contain 85% of xylose residues.78 One of the characteristic properties of xylan is its ease of hydrolysis. Because it hydrolyzes much more readily than cellulose, mild acid treatment may be employed to bring about preferential hydrolysis of xylan from plant material. Xylose is ordinarily prepared in the laboratory by direct sulfuric acid hydrolysis of the native xylan in ground corn cobs.74 Hydrolysis in hydrochloric acid proceeds rapidly, but decomposition to furfural also occurs to some extent.76 A commercial method for the production of D-xylose from cottonseed hulls76 and straw77 and from corn cobs17 78 has been described. 

Determination of xylan is frequently made by estimation of furfural production. Data so obtained, even when appropriately corrected for furfural that arises from uronic acid, may be high if araban is present in the polysaccharide preparation. In the absence of interfering carbohydrates, furfural estimation may lead to accurate xylan values. 

The two most important natural pentoses, 1 -arabinose and 1 -xylose, occur in nature as polymeric anhydrides, the so-called pentosans, viz. araban, the chief constituent of many vegetable gums (cherry gum, gum arabic, bran gum), and xylan, in wood. From these pentapolyoses there are produced by hydrolysis first the simple pentoses which are then converted by sufficiently strong acids into furfural. This aldehyde is thus also produced as a by-product in the saccharification of wood (cellulose) by dilute acids. Furfural, being a tertiary aldehyde, is very similar to benzaldehyde, and like the latter undergoes the acyloin reaction (furoin) and takes part in the Perkin synthesis. It also resembles benzaldehyde in its reaction with ammonia (p. 215). 

Levulinic acid and formic acid are end products of the acidic and thermal decomposition of lignocellulosic material, their multistep formation from the hexoses contained therein proceeding through hydroxymethylfurfural (HMF) as the key intermediate, while the hemicellulosic part, mostly xylans, produces furfural.A commercially viable fractionation technology for the specific... 

Like D-glucose and D-fructose, however, D-xylose can be utilized chemic ly or microbially—to generate a variety of interesting five-ca n c emica s o er than furfural (vide supra) or xylitol, a noncaloric sweetener, both being duectly produced from xylan hydrolysates, that is, without the actual isolation of the sugar. Other readily accessible intermediate products of high preparative utiUty (Scheme 2.14) are the open-chain fixed dithioacetal, the D-xylal, and D-hydroxy-xylal esters, or pyrazol or imidazol A -heterocycles with a hydrophilic trihydroxypropyl side chain. 

Furoic acid (furan-2-carboxylic acid, or pyromucic acid) is used as a bactericide, and the furoate esters are used as flavoring agents, as antibiotic and corticosteroid intermediates. It is obtained by the enzymatic or chemical/catalytic aerobial oxidation of furfural (2-furalaldehyde) the latter is the only unsaturated large-volume organic chemical prepared from carbohydrates today. D-Xylose and L-ara-binose, the pentoses contained in the xylan-rich portion of hemicelluloses from agricultural and forestry wastes, under the conditions used for hydrolysis undergo dehydration to furfural. 

Several Py-MS studies were done on homoglycans. A Py-FI MS study on a (1- 4)-p-xylan [2] showed several characteristic ions such as m/z = 132 (associated with the monomer unit C5H8O4), the ion m/z = 96 (associated with furfural, C5H4O2), and the ion m/z = 114 (probably associated with 3-hydroxy-2-penteno-1,5-lactone, CsHsOs). The study showed that retro-aldolization between C-1 and C-2 atoms does not take place. Smaller ions seen in the spectrum were probably generated from further pyrolysis of the initially formed fragments. 

Furfural is formed by dehydration of pentose. Xylose is a major aldopentose and is involved as a form of xylan in hemicelluloses. Unlike glucose, furfural can be formed from xylose by Bronsted acids alone at high temperature, although the furfural selectivity is low. A variety of Bronsted acid catalysts have been examined for furfural synthesis and they are H-type zeolites such as H-mordenite and H-Y faujasite [183], delaminated zeolite [184], H-MCM-22 [185], ion-exchange resins [186], sulfonated porous silicas [187-189], porous niobium silicate [190], metal oxide nanosheets [51], and sulfated zirconia [191]. Sulfated tin oxide (S04 /Sn02) is an effective catalyst for furfural formation [192] because of the combination of Lewis acid and Bronsted acid properties, as well as HMF synthesis. 

Birch contains a higher amoxmt of xylan polysaccharides in its cell wall, so xylose sugar is found in higher concentrations in birch tree hydrolyzates as compared to other tree biomass. Relatively low levels of maimose were reported from birch tree (Keranen et al., 2013). Furfural and HMF concentrations were foxmd to be low in birch tree when compared to aspen. Hence partially fermentable sugars can be obtained from birch wood biomass (Tables 16.1 and 16.2). 

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