1. Introduction
Lignocellulosic plant biomass is an important renewable carbon
resource for the biorefinery industry, and is thus considered a sustainable
and environmentally friendly alternative to the current
petroleum platform [1]. Lignocellulosic biomass, such as agricultural
residues and herbaceous energy crops, consists mainly
of three different types of biopolymers i.e. cellulose (35–50%),
hemicellulose (25–30%) and lignin (25–30%) [2]. Cellulose and
hemicellulose are degraded to sugars, which are versatile starting
materials for further conversion by fermentation, biocatalytic, and
chemocatalytic processes to value-added products, including biofuels,
biopolymers and chemicals. Improvement of microbial and
enzymatic processes on lignocellulosic biomass degradation is thus
an important area of research in sustainable “green” biotechnology.