2011 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

Glucose production from cellulose using ionic liquids

Research Project

Project/Area Number	21655057
Research Category	Grant-in-Aid for Challenging Exploratory Research
Allocation Type	Single-year Grants
Research Field	Environmental chemistry
Research Institution	Yamaguchi University
Principal Investigator	KAMIMURA Akio 山口大学, 大学院・医学系研究科, 教授 (30194971)
Research Collaborator	OYAMA Natsumi 山口大学, 大学院・医学系研究科, 修士課程学生
Project Period (FY)	2009 – 2011
Keywords	セルロース / イオン液体 / グルコース
Research Abstract	A new method to produce glucose from cellulose was developed. A mixture of cellulose, hydrochloric acid, and lithium chloride in hydrophobic ionic liquids provided efficient hydrolysis of cellulose to give glucose more than 40% yield. A selective formation of glucose was achieved under these conditions. Glucose was isolated without contamination of ionic liquids, which potentially inhibit fermentation of glucose to produce ethanol. The ionic liquids were recovered in more than 99% and used for the hydrolysis for several iterations without loss of efficiency. The yield of glucose increased as the amounts of lithium chloride increased.

(4 results)