Although duckweed has been studied for the recovery of
nutrients from wastewaters for decades, broad use of largescale
duckweed-based treatment systems does not exist yet
because of the lack of commercially viable products that can
be derived from the harvested duckweed biomass [9]. Owing
to its high protein content (15e45 w% dry basis) and an amino
acid composition similar to that of soybean, duckweed has
been proposed as an alternative animal feed [10], successfully
providing a large proportion of the protein required by the
animals with no adverse effects. The carbohydrate content of
wastewater-derived duckweed is usually low (3e15%) but can
be substantially increased by manipulating the growth conditions,
e.g., pH, phosphate concentration, and nutrient
accessibility [11e13]. This makes duckweed a promising substrate
to produce liquid fuel through fermentation. Xu et al.
achieved a starch content of 30% after growing Spirodela polyrrhiza
in nutrient-free well water for 8 days. After enzymatic
hydrolysis and yeast fermentation of the high-starch duckweed,
~95% of the theoretical starch-to-ethanol conversion
was realized, resulting in an estimated ethanol yield of
6.42 103 L ha1 yr1 [14]. Even so, more engineering efforts
are required to develop an array of duckweed-derived products
that are commercially viable.
Hydrogen has emerged as one very promising alternative
energy source because it is clean, efficient, and can be produced
from a variety of means, including thermochemical
processes or fermentation of plant biomass and organic residues.
So far, the most extensively studied plant biomass for
biohydrogen production is lignocellulosic biomass including
corn stover, wheat straw, rice straw, sweet sorghum, and
sugarcane bagasse [15]. Lignocellulosic biomass is abundant,
has a high carbohydrate content, however, its conversion is
challenging because hydrogen-producing microorganisms
can not directly utilize cellulose and hemicellulose, the major
carbohydrates in lignocellulosic biomass. Lignocellulosic
biomass also contains a large amount of lignin shielding cellulose
and hemicellulose from microbial degradation. Intensive
thermo-chemical pretreatment and subsequent
enzymatic hydrolysis are needed before lignocellulosic feedstocks
can be fermented and hydrogen is produced [16].
Depending on the characteristics of the feedstock and the
conditions applied in various conversion steps, biohydrogen
yields of 103e354 mL H2 g1 hexose have been achieved from
lignocellulosic biomass [17e20]. However, many have questioned
the economic viability of lignocellulosic conversion
bioprocesses, in particular because of the substantial capital
and operating costs associated with the thermo-chemical and
enzymatic pretreatment of the feedstock.
Duckweed has a different cell wall structure than typical
terrestrial plants and has a very low lignin content (