Scaling up xylitol bioproduction: Challenges to achieve a profitable bioprocess

Sarah S. Queiroz, Fanny M. Jofre, Solange I. Mussatto and Maria das Graças A. Felipe

Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, 2022, vol. 154, issue C

Abstract: Xylitol is a GRAS (Generally Recognized as Safe) polyol commonly used in the food industry and able to promote several benefits to the health. In addition, it can also be used as a building block molecule for the manufacture of different high-value chemicals. Currently, the commercial production of xylitol occurs by chemical route through the catalytic hydrogenation of xylose from lignocellulosic biomass. Since this is an expensive process due to the severe reactional conditions employed, the biotechnological route for xylitol production, which comprises the biological conversion of xylose into xylitol, emerges as a potential lower-cost alternative to obtain this polyol due to the milder process conditions required. However, the biotechnological route still presents important bottlenecks and challenges that impairs the process scaling up. Modern strategies and technologies that can potentially improve xylitol bioproduction include adaptive evolution of microbial strains to enhance their tolerance to inhibitors and the xylose uptake rate during the fermentation step; development of engineered microorganisms to result in higher xylose-to-xylitol bioconversion yields; as well as xylitol purification techniques to improve the recovery yields. Moreover, techno-economic analysis of the overall production chain is essential to identify the process viability for large-scale implementation as well as the steps requiring improvements. These are some key factors discussed in this review, which aims to provide insights for the development of a more economically competitive, less energy demanding and scalable new technology for xylitol production.

Keywords: Xylitol; Adaptive evolution; Strain development; Techno-economic analysis; Scaling up (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2022
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1364032121010583
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:rensus:v:154:y:2022:i:c:s1364032121010583

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.elsevier.com/wps/find/journaldescription.cws_home/600126/bibliographic
http://www.elsevier. ... 600126/bibliographic

DOI: 10.1016/j.rser.2021.111789

Access Statistics for this article

Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews is currently edited by L. Kazmerski

More articles in Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews from Elsevier
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Catherine Liu ().