US researchers create "super" yeast for pine-to-ethanol conversion

Nov 21, 2011 - University of Georgia (UCA) researchers have created a "super strain" of yeast capable of efficiently fermenting ethanol from pretreated pine, an announcement on the university's website said last week.

Joy Doran-Peterson, associate professor of microbiology in the Franklin College of Arts and Sciences, noted that currently yeast was used to generate ethanol from corn or sugar cane, which were more susceptible to fermentation.

In order pinewood to be fermented with yeast, the material is first treated with heat and chemicals, so that the wood can open for enzymes that break the cellulose into sugars. The yeast will then turn the sugars into ethanol. However, the pretreatment results in compounds that tend to destroy the yeast, hampering ethanol generation.

The yeast developed by Doran-Peterson and doctoral candidate G. Matt Hawkins can resist the toxic compounds and generate ethanol from higher concentrations of pretreated pine than previous studies indicate, according to the research.

The statement said that the new yeast was able to produce ethanol in fermentations of pretreated wood including up to 17.5% solid biomass. Scientists have previously managed to produce ethanol in fermentations containing 5-8% solids. Studies at 12% solids recorded a significant drop in ethanol generation, the statement said.

The research was published online in Biotechnology for Biofuels.

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