A Method to Evaluate Biomass Accessibility in Wet State Based on Thermoporometry

The substrate accessibility to enzyme has been considered as one of the most important factors for biomass conversion. To avoid the irreversible collapse of pore structure during the drying of sample, the measurement needs to be performed in a wet state. In this report, a thermoporometry method based on DSC isothermal step procedure is explained in details. This detects the amount of nonfreezing bound water in a wet sample and the value is expressed into pore size distribution with the Gibbs–Thomson equation. Information on pore size distribution and pore volume can be used to evaluate biomass accessibility.