Ammonia‐Derived Acidic Compound Pretreatment: Fractionation of Lignocellulosic Biomass for Boosting Enzymatic Hydrolysis to Efficiently Produce Bioethanol by Yeast

Development of pretreatment to reduce biomass recalcitrance is essential to produce fermentable sugars, which is used as carbon sources for microorganisms to synthesize biofuels. Lignin in lignocellulose is generally removed by alkaline pretreatment (e.g., NH 4 OH, ethanediamine), while the severe environment causes equipment corrosion and forms toxic inhibitors. Using ─NH 2 /NH 4 + ‐derived acidic compounds (ADACs) might achieve ideal lignin removal efficiency and fermentability. Herein, five ADACs including ammonium chloride (AC), ammonium sulfate (AS), ammonium acetate (AA), butanamide (BuA), and sulfamic acid (SuA) were used for corn stover (CS) pretreatment. The xylan removals were 16.69%–39.49% when pretreating CS by ADAC at 150 °C, which resulted in lower glucose yields of Saccharomyces cerevisiae from SuA‐pretreated hydrolysates containing ~60 g/L glucose. Overall, it is the first report to evaluate the typical ADACs for lignocellulose fractionation, which exhibits considerable potential for bioethanol production.