Glucose from straw may play a big role in the future production of many everyday products. ###An award winning PhD project from DTU Chemical Engineering aims to uncover how new processes can help increase the profit values from straw and make it an effective and profitable business.###As the world population continues to grow and the search for alternative resources intensifies as a result, researchers are always looking at different and more efficient ways to use the materials at our disposal. ###For example, a residual product from agriculture, straw, is mostly incinerated for energy, but could instead prove to be a valuable source of building blocks for many other products, such as pharmaceuticals, cosmetics and textiles.###These pkirkland calcium citrate magnesium and zinc priceroducts can be derived from glucose and another monosaccharid, which can be obtained from straw and other sources when they are processed. ###The challenge is that types of sugar like glucose and xylose, although they are used in different applications, have very similar chemical structures and are therefore difficult to separate.###However, if a PhD project at DTU Chemical calcium citrate magnesium and zincEngineering goes as planned, this could be a different story in the future. ###The idea is to use membranes to separate different sugar molecules in bio-refineries. ###An idea, which PhD student Sofie Thage Morthensen recently secured a travel grant from EliteForsk.###Super selective###“We all use high value products and at the same time we have to feed a growing world population, which increases the need for alternative resources, such as biomass. We have biomass everywhere – straw for example,” says Sofie Thage Morthensen, who spends her time at the Center for BioProcess Engineering.###“Membranes are super selective materials with the potential to separate sugar molecules at a higher throughput and at milder process conditions compared to other separation processes,” she continues.###For certain applications, the membranes can become even more effective with the use of enzymes as catalysts to modify the process stream. ##citracal plus vitamin d#In scientific terms, the concept is known as “reactive membrane separation”.

A costly process###However, as is the case with most concepts, economy has a big say in whether or not it will become a success – and right now Morthensen is faced with some difficult challenges. ###For example, enzymes often cost more than the product they contribute to produce, which requires thekirkland vitamins calcium citrate magnesium and zinc ability to use the enzymes over a longer period.###“We also work with a feedstock – straw – that is generally a waste product and hence has very low value,” says Morthensen. ###“In order to make it profitable to reuse straw instead of incinerate or deposit it, we have to develop processes with maximum yield and efficiency.”###One of the next steps for her will be to test the reactive membrane separation on an actualzinc picolinate dan gluconate flow of biomass. ###Her project is part of the Biovalue Spir platform that aims to increase the importance of biomass in the future.###Story by Rasmus-Hoejmark-Ravn, Technical University of Denmark