Enzymes targeting lignin-carbohydrate complexes

Conference poster, 2022

The plant cell wall is the main component of wood, and it has a highly complex structure that confers limited accessibility to the polymers that compose it, lowering the possibility of extracting them efficiently. Lignocellulose in particular is highly recalcitrant to enzymatic hydrolysis due to the presence of lignin-carbohydrate complexes (LCCs), in which the polysaccharides of the cell wall are linked to lignin with covalent bonds. In this context, the utilization of enzymes targeting specific linkages between the polymers is of crucial importance, but still little is known about the enzyme activity on lignocellulosic materials.

CE15 enzymes are glucuronoyl esterases that have been suggested to play a key role in reducing lignocellulose recalcitrance by cleaving the ester bond between glucuronoxylan and lignin in LCCs.