This research was completed my freshman year, 2015-2016. The project was on how to most efficiently convert biomass waste (corn stover) into useful energy using both chemical and mechanical pretreatment techniques. We tested treating the biomass with sodium hydroxide and calcium hydroxide to help break down the lignan before further processing. The main mechanical pretreatment we tried was shock pretreatment, which involves instigating an explosion of sorts to help break down the lignan.
I will add some more detail and pictures here in the future. Figure 1 is from the PhD thesis of my mentor at the time, Austin Bond. The thesis is titled "Making Bombs for Peaceful Purposes: How Explosive Processes Render Lignocellulosic Biomsass More Amenable to Biological Digestion" and is available online.
I will add some more detail and pictures here in the future. Figure 1 is from the PhD thesis of my mentor at the time, Austin Bond. The thesis is titled "Making Bombs for Peaceful Purposes: How Explosive Processes Render Lignocellulosic Biomsass More Amenable to Biological Digestion" and is available online.