Browsing by Author "Balan, Venkatesh"
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Item Open Access Arabinose as an overlooked sugar for microbial bioproduction of chemical building blocks(Taylor and Francis, 2023-11-06) Kumar, Vinod; Agrawal, Deepti; Bommareddy, Rajesh Reddy; Islam, M. Ahsanul; Jacob, Samuel; Balan, Venkatesh; Singh, Vijai; Thakur, Vijay Kumar; Navani, Naveen Kumar; Scrutton, Nigel S.The circular economy is anticipated to bring a disruptive transformation in manufacturing technologies. Robust and industrial scalable microbial strains that can simultaneously assimilate and valorize multiple carbon substrates are highly desirable, as waste bioresources contain substantial amounts of renewable and fermentable carbon, which is diverse. Lignocellulosic biomass (LCB) is identified as an inexhaustible and alternative resource to reduce global dependence on oil. Glucose, xylose, and arabinose are the major monomeric sugars in LCB. However, primary research has focused on the use of glucose. On the other hand, the valorization of pentose sugars, xylose, and arabinose, has been mainly overlooked, despite possible assimilation by vast microbial communities. The present review highlights the research efforts that have explicitly proven the suitability of arabinose as the starting feedstock for producing various chemical building blocks via biological routes. It begins by analyzing the availability of various arabinose-rich biorenewable sources that can serve as potential feedstocks for biorefineries. The subsequent section outlines the current understanding of arabinose metabolism, biochemical routes prevalent in prokaryotic and eukaryotic systems, and possible products that can be derived from this sugar. Further, currently, exemplar products from arabinose, including arabitol, 2,3-butanediol, 1,2,3-butanetriol, ethanol, lactic acid, and xylitol are discussed, which have been produced by native and non-native microbial strains using metabolic engineering and genome editing tools. The final section deals with the challenges and obstacles associated with arabinose-based production, followed by concluding remarks and prospects.Item Open Access Carbon emissions and decarbonisation: the role and relevance of fermentation industry in chemical sector(Elsevier, 2023-10-07) Agrawal, Deepti; Awani, Kelvin; Nabavi, Seyed Ali; Balan, Venkatesh; Jin, Mingjie; Aminabhavi, Tejraj M.; Dubey, Kashyap Kumar; Kumar, VinodFermentation industry is emerging as sustainable technological alternative to cater the production of various chemical building blocks which are commercially manufactured by petrochemical route. The primary reason for this major transition is global commitment towards decarbonisation of chemical sector, as their conventional fossil-based routes pose serious environmental threat. For instance, in 2022, the direct carbon dioxide (CO2) emission during synthesis of primary chemicals accounted for ∼ 920 Mt. CO2 is one of the prominent greenhouse gases (GHG’s), contributing majorly towards global warming effect and drastic climate change. Fermentation industry largely thrives on exploiting fermentable and organic carbon derived from edible and/or non-edible biomass and transforming them to valorised products using microbial cell factories. Therefore, the production of bio-based chemicals via this route is often associated with low or zero-carbon footprint, resulting in either carbon neutral or carbon negative products. This review focuses on different types of fermentative processes and their impact on carbon release and decarbonisation. It further discusses the relevance and contribution of fermentation industry as well as biological processes to provide a sustainable solution towards decarbonisation of chemical sector. Further, it showcases the advantages of some commercial proven and/or pipeline bio-based products over their conventional competitor fossil-based products, especially from an environmental viewpoint. Finally, advantages of biogenic CO2 from fermentation industry over other sources and CO2 removal from fermentation as a platform for carbon offsetting are covered.Item Embargo Potential of using microalgae to sequester carbon dioxide and processing to bioproducts(Royal Society of Chemistry, 2023-09-15) Balan, Venkatesh; Pierson, James; Husain, Hasan; Kumar, Sandeep; Saffron, Christopher; Kumar, VinodAlgae are microscopic photosynthetic prokaryotic or eukaryotic organisms that can naturally grow in fresh or marine water in the presence of sunlight. Algae are capable of sequestering CO2 and utilize nutrients like nitrates, phosphates, and other micronutrients in water to increase their body mass. In the past few decades, algal biomass has been investigated by the scientific community because of its promising applications in producing renewable food, feed, fuels, and chemicals. Additionally, microalgae's ability to fix large amounts of greenhouse gas (GHG) such as carbon dioxide (CO2) has led researchers to investigate microalgae as an alternative way of combating climate change by sequestering flue gas containing CO2 emitted from industries such as coal power plants, cement, steel, and petroleum refineries. This review outlines different sources of CO2 emissions and capturing technology including microalgae. Details about the methods of cultivating and separating the algal biomass followed by thermochemical and biochemical conversion to fuels/chemicals, microalgae-derived bioplastics, and microalgae biomass blended plastic are outlined in this review. Commercially viable continuous and semi-continuous biorefining processes such as hydrothermal flash hydrolysis and environmental benefits of using microalgae as carbon sinks and wastewater treatment are also provided.