No Barriers to Cellulose Breakdown Alex Berlin

摘要

One of the most promising routes to sustainably produced liquid fuels is the enzymatic conversion of bio-mass. Efficient enzymatic conversion of biomass into fermentable sugars requires the concerted action of optimally balanced mixes of glycoside hydrolases and accessory proteins (1, 2). On page 1513 of this issue, Brunecky et al. (3) show that CelA, an unusually large secreted multidomain cellu-lase from the thermophilic bacterium Cal-dicellulosiruptor bescii, efficiently breaks down microcrystalline cellulose, outperforming enzymes typically used commercially to break down biomass.