Univ. of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, IL (United States)
Aix-Marseille Univ., Marseille (France); Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS), Marseille (France); Centrale Méditerranée, Marseille (France); Institut Fresnel, Marseille (France)
Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL), Oak Ridge, TN (United States)
Cellulose, hemicellulose, and lignin─the most abundant biopolymers on Earth─compose the structural matrix of plant biomass, providing renewable resources critical to bioenergy and sustainable materials. Despite their importance, the nanoscale mechanochemical processes underlying lignocellulose assembly during plant secondary cell wall formation remain poorly understood, hindering advancements in biomass conversion technologies. Here, in this study, we synthesize a biomimetic model system comprising cellulose–hemicellulose nanofibrils (CHN) to examine guaiacyl lignin polymerization in a physiologically relevant context. Using advanced nanocharacterization─scattering-type scanning near-field optical microscopy (s-SNOM) with infrared nanospectroscopy coupled to solid-state nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR)─we reveal that hemicellulose presence considerably modulates lignin deposition and alters its interunit bond distribution. Specifically, hemicellulose-rich environments dramatically reduce lignin deposition by approximately 50% and yield highly condensed lignin structures characterized by severely reduced β–O–4′ linkages (<2%) and suppressed β–β′ linkages. Conversely, cellulose-alone scaffolds support notably higher β–O–4′ content (∼10%), resulting in a more uniform nanoscale lignin coating. Our work helps explain how accessible hemicellulose sites, both sterically and chemically, direct radical coupling during lignification, fundamentally reshaping lignin’s nanoscale architecture. These findings deepen our mechanistic understanding of plant cell wall biosynthesis and inform strategies aimed at enhancing biomass deconstruction efficiency for sustainable bioenergy applications.
@article{osti_3007925,
author = {Snyder, Patrick J. and Allard, Valentin and Bhagia, Samarthya and Farahi, Rubye H. and Lereu, Aude L. and Backlund, Mikael P. and Passian, Ali},
title = {Hemicellulose Modulates Nanoscale Lignin Architecture in Synthetic Plant Cell Walls},
annote = {Cellulose, hemicellulose, and lignin─the most abundant biopolymers on Earth─compose the structural matrix of plant biomass, providing renewable resources critical to bioenergy and sustainable materials. Despite their importance, the nanoscale mechanochemical processes underlying lignocellulose assembly during plant secondary cell wall formation remain poorly understood, hindering advancements in biomass conversion technologies. Here, in this study, we synthesize a biomimetic model system comprising cellulose–hemicellulose nanofibrils (CHN) to examine guaiacyl lignin polymerization in a physiologically relevant context. Using advanced nanocharacterization─scattering-type scanning near-field optical microscopy (s-SNOM) with infrared nanospectroscopy coupled to solid-state nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR)─we reveal that hemicellulose presence considerably modulates lignin deposition and alters its interunit bond distribution. Specifically, hemicellulose-rich environments dramatically reduce lignin deposition by approximately 50% and yield highly condensed lignin structures characterized by severely reduced β–O–4′ linkages (<2%) and suppressed β–β′ linkages. Conversely, cellulose-alone scaffolds support notably higher β–O–4′ content (∼10%), resulting in a more uniform nanoscale lignin coating. Our work helps explain how accessible hemicellulose sites, both sterically and chemically, direct radical coupling during lignification, fundamentally reshaping lignin’s nanoscale architecture. These findings deepen our mechanistic understanding of plant cell wall biosynthesis and inform strategies aimed at enhancing biomass deconstruction efficiency for sustainable bioenergy applications.},
doi = {10.1021/acsnano.5c09006},
url = {https://www.osti.gov/biblio/3007925},
journal = {ACS Nano},
issn = {ISSN 1936-0851},
number = {47},
volume = {19},
place = {United States},
publisher = {American Chemical Society (ACS)},
year = {2025},
month = {11}}
Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series A: Mathematical, Physical and Engineering Sciences, Vol. 362, Issue 1817https://doi.org/10.1098/rsta.2003.1347