Pyrolytic conversion of inactive biomass derivatives into bioactive compounds

GIRI, GF; RAMALLO, IA; FURLAN, RLE; SUAREZ, AG; SPANEVELLO, RA

Golden

Jornada; ACS Summer School on Green Chemistry and Sustainable Energy; 2013

American Chemistry Society

It is generally recognized that the resources of the world are limited and sustainability has become a crucial point for the development of chemical products. These circumstances impose a great urgency to find renewable sources for their transformation into useful products including chemicals, fuels, and materials for replacing the enormous demand for petroleum. Biomass has received particular attention because it represents the only abundant source of renewable raw materials. IIn this sense, the disposal products derived from the human activity also constitute part of biomass which could be recycled to favor the preservation of the environment.1 On the other hand, antioxidants play an important role as a health protecting factor minimizing the adverse effects generated by Reactive Oxygen Species (ROS) in living systems, thus preventing diseases caused by oxidative stress. Also they have an important role in the oxidative stabilization of a variety of industrial products, such as plastics, foods, cosmetics, fuels, lubricants, and other chemicals.2 In this work, we present the generation of antioxidant compounds subjecting soy hull and soy flour to a pyrolytic process. We evaluated the presence of antioxidant activity on the products obtained from the pyrolysis and studied the effects of acid treatment before the thermal decomposition and the pyrolysis temperature on the products composition. The results support the use of soy flour and soy hull (oil industry byproducts) as sources of products that show a very promising antioxidant activity. Conclusion: Thermal treatment of soy hull and soy flour (two main industrial byproducts) generated compounds mixtures with very interesting antioxidant activity and could have potential industrial applications. This methodology could constitute an alternative way to recycle and add value to these biomass sources.