Council of Scientific and Industrial Research

Prasanta Kumar Rout

Ram Rajasekharan

Ashween Deepak Nannaware

Om Prakash

Agricultural residues (biomasses) have come-up as potential valuable renewable resources for transformation into many bio-products. To achieve this goal, the isolation of major biopolymers in their purest form through an economical process is demanded for synthesis of the target fine chemicals without impurities. However, the difficulty of fractionating the biomass into cellulose, hemicellulose and lignin by a simple method has greatly limited their isolation from agricultural residues. Also, the lipids and waxes present on the surface of the agricultural residues protect it from external chemical and microbial agents. To overcome this issue, the lipids and waxes have been isolated from the biomass through two step organic solvents extraction. Thereafter lignin, hemicellulose and cellulose are isolated successively from the de-waxed biomass.

Eco-friendly process for the isolation of biopolymers from agricultural residues

The present invention relates to a process for chemical conversion of cellulose isolated from aromatic spent biomass to hydroxymethyl furfural using an eco-friendly and economical liquids system with recoverable and reusable solid Indion catalysts and zeolite-phosphomolybdic acid hybrid catalysts. The present invention further relates to the preparation of an effective hybrid catalyst i.e. zeolite-phosphomolybdic acid catalyst for synthesis of HMF. The selectivity and yield of HMF is nearly doubled in zeolite-phosphomolybdic acid hybrid catalyst compared to the individual catalysts (zeolite or phosphomolybdic acid) or combination of catalysts viz. zeolite and phosphomolybdic acid. 

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Lucknow, India

Prasanta Kumar Rout