Can Biomass Mastication Assist the Downstreaming of Polyhydroxyalkanoates Produced from Mixed Microbial Cultures?

Polyhydroxyalkanoates (PHAs) are natural polyesters which biodegrade in soils and oceans but have more than double the cost of comparable oil-based polymers. PHA downstreaming from its biomass represents 50% of its overall cost. Here, in an attempt to assist downstreaming, mastication of wet biomasses is tested as a new mechanical continuous biomass pretreatment with potential for industrial upscaling. Downstreaming conditions where both product recovery and purity are low due to the large amount of treated wet biomass (50% water) were targeted with the following process: extraction of 20 g in 100 mL solvent at 30 °C for 2 h, followed by 4.8 h digestion of 20 g in 0.3 M NaOH. Under the studied conditions, NaOH digestion was more effective than solvent extraction in recovering larger PHA amounts, but with less purity. A nearly 50% loss of PHA was seen during digestion after mastication. PHAs downstreamed by digestion with large amounts of impurities started to degrade at lower temperatures, but their melt elasticity was thermally stable at 170 °C. As such, these materials are attractive as fully PHA-compatible processing aids, reinforcing fillers or viscosity modifiers. On the other hand, wet biomass mastication before solvent extraction improves PHA purity and thermal stability as well as the melt rheology, which recovers the viscoelasticity measured with a PHA extracted from a dried biomass.