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University of Tennessee, Knoxville
Faculty Publications and Other Works -- Biochemistry, Cellular and Molecular Biology
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Full-Text Articles in Biochemistry, Biophysics, and Structural Biology
Mechanism Of Lignin Inhibition Of Enzymatic Biomass Deconstruction, Josh V. Vermaas, Loukas Petridis, Xianghong Qi, Roland Schulz, Benjamin Lindner, Jeremy C. Smith
Mechanism Of Lignin Inhibition Of Enzymatic Biomass Deconstruction, Josh V. Vermaas, Loukas Petridis, Xianghong Qi, Roland Schulz, Benjamin Lindner, Jeremy C. Smith
Faculty Publications and Other Works -- Biochemistry, Cellular and Molecular Biology
Background
The conversion of plant biomass to ethanol via enzymatic cellulose hydrolysis offers a potentially sustainable route to biofuel production. However, the inhibition of enzymatic activity in pretreated biomass by lignin severely limits the efficiency of this process.
Results
By performing atomic-detail molecular dynamics simulation of a biomass model containing cellulose, lignin, and cellulases (TrCel7A), we elucidate detailed lignin inhibition mechanisms. We find that lignin binds preferentially both to the elements of cellulose to which the cellulases also preferentially bind (the hydrophobic faces) and also to the specific residues on the cellulose-binding module of the cellulase that are …