A review on delignification of lignocellulosic biomass for enhancement of ethanol production potential

In the recent past, significant research has been made by thermal, mechanical, chemical and microbial pretreatments in the process of delignification. Production of ethanol from the lignocellulosic material has been done in three major steps: (i) delignification; (ii) depolymerization and (iii) fermentation. Pretreatment has been one of the most expensive processing steps in cellulosic biomass to fermentable sugar conversion. Present review article presents recent advances in the field of delignification. Research article also comprehensively discusses the different pretreatment methods along with effect of delignification on ethanol production and the uses of lignin in different industries. It has been found out that; pretreatment methods have significant impact on production efficiency of ethanol from biomass. This further signifies that, the pretreatment results must be balanced against their impact on cost of the processing steps and the trade-off between operating costs, capital costs and biomass cost.