Experiment Boosts Ethanol Production by About 120%

Written by Bruno Teles

Published on 20/03/2023 at 16:44

produção do etanol (foto/divulgação)

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In One Year, Researchers from Bioplan-UEM and Lafieco-USP Achieved an Impressive 120% Increase in Sugarcane-Based Ethanol Production.

Biologist Wanderley Dantas dos Santos (photo) supervised the application of three natural compounds on the plants: one containing methylenedioxacetic acid (MDCA), another with piperolonic acid (PIP), and a third with daidzin (DZN). These compounds were specifically designed and applied to sugarcane, soy, and brachiaria to take advantage of their unique characteristics and properties.

According to Santos, MDCA, PIP, and DZN are lignin inhibitors, a molecule that provides rigidity to the plant cell wall. “In general, the compound we developed alters the lignin metabolism. This helps penetrate the plant’s cell wall, where cellulose is located. So there is potential to produce more sugars, more carbohydrates.”

The experiment was published in an article in the journal Biomass and Bioenergy. The project is supported by the Research Center for Innovation in Greenhouse Gases (RCGI), Research Center for Engineering (CPE) formed by FAPESP and Shell at the Polytechnic Institute (Poli-USP).

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Increase in Ethanol Production

In the case of sugarcane, the discovery may help to expand and shrink the production of so-called second-generation ethanol, produced from plant biomass residue (bagasse). The main producer of this alcohol is the joint venture Raízen, formed by Cosan and Shell, located in São Paulo state, responsible for 1.5% of the national production.

Currently, the industry is financially expensive for conducting the so-called pre-treatment, which removes lignin to make carbohydrates easier to digest and produce enzymes that can ferment sugars to generate new generation ethanol.

The biomass from sugarcane can be better utilized with the application of compounds developed by researchers. The researchers also tested the compounds on brachiaria animals used to feed livestock.

Modified lignin-containing soy can also be used as animal feed. Today, livestock is often fed with corn and protein supplements. Soy can partially replace this protein supplement. As the compound is applied, it becomes nutritionally more palatable and will satisfy the animal with smaller portions of feed.

Brazilian Corn Ethanol Production Grows More Than 1,000% in Six Years

Corn ethanol production, common in the United States, gained momentum in Brazil in less than a decade and is expected to consolidate a 1,000% increase compared to the crop six years ago. According to the National Union of Corn Ethanol (Unem), the growth forecast is attributed to the increase in corn production capacity, as well as the expansion and adoption of technology in the industrial sector.

Experiment Boosts Ethanol Production by About 120%

In One Year, Researchers from Bioplan-UEM and Lafieco-USP Achieved an Impressive 120% Increase in Sugarcane-Based Ethanol Production.

Increase in Ethanol Production

Brazilian Corn Ethanol Production Grows More Than 1,000% in Six Years

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Experiment Boosts Ethanol Production by About 120%

In One Year, Researchers from Bioplan-UEM and Lafieco-USP Achieved an Impressive 120% Increase in Sugarcane-Based Ethanol Production.

Increase in Ethanol Production

Brazilian Corn Ethanol Production Grows More Than 1,000% in Six Years

With billions in loans, China is rebuilding Nigeria’s railway network from scratch, abandoning the British colonial tracks that have turned to scrap and creating a corridor of over 1,300 km to take the load off the roads of Africa’s largest economy.

A British company has installed in the middle of the ocean the world’s first floating platform that generates electricity 24 hours a day from the temperature difference between the surface and the depths of the Atlantic, without relying on wind or sun.

China is building an artificial island in the middle of the sea, covering 20 km², to construct the largest offshore airport in the world, the Dalian Jinzhouwan. This $4.3 billion project is anchored on more than 3,000 pillars embedded in the rock beneath the ocean and is scheduled to open in 2035.

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A robot named Walter does the work of five bricklayers per hour and can save the construction industry, where the average age of professionals is 46 years and almost no one wants to learn the trade anymore, in the United Kingdom.

Austrian engineers have developed an inflatable concrete technology that transforms flat slabs into domes using only air pressure, eliminating scaffolding and temporary forms, and potentially changing the way bridges, tunnels, and curved roofs are constructed worldwide.

The James Webb telescope spotted a planet 700 light-years from Earth with mornings full of sand clouds and nights with clear skies, the temperature difference between the two hemispheres reaches an impressive 170 degrees.

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In China, even those who beg on the street already have a QR Code, paper money has practically disappeared from daily life in just ten years, and the entire country has come to live on invisible payments via mobile phones.

Brazil will harvest a record crop of up to 357 million tons of grains, but it does not have the capacity to store a large part of it. The storage deficit has reached the highest level in history and is equivalent to almost the entire production of Argentina.

Scientists considered detonating 213 nuclear bombs in the Sahara to create an artificial sea the size of El Salvador, with each explosion being a hundred times more powerful than the Hiroshima bomb, and the goal was to generate more energy than Egypt’s largest hydroelectric plant.