Saulnier, Brian K.Siahkamari, MohsenSingh, Sandip K.Nejad, MojganHodge, David B.2023-02-232023-02-232022-12Effect of Dilute Acid Pretreatment and Lignin Extraction Conditions on Lignin Properties and Suitability as a Phenol Replacement in Phenol-Formaldehyde Wood Adhesives0021-8561https://scholarworks.montana.edu/handle/1/17724This document is the unedited Author’s version of a Submitted Work that was subsequently accepted for publication in Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry, copyright © American Chemical Society after peer review. To access the final edited and published work see https://doi.org/10.1021/acs.jafc.2c07299Corn stover was subjected to dilute sulfuric acid pretreatment to assess the impact of pretreatment conditions on lignin extractability, properties, and utility as a phenol replacement in wood phenol-formaldehyde (PF) adhesives. It was identified that both formic acid and NaOH could extract and recover 60–70% of the lignin remaining after pretreatment and enzymatic hydrolysis under the mildest pretreatment conditions while simultaneously achieving reasonable enzymatic hydrolysis yields (>60%). The availability of reaction sites for the incorporation of lignins into the PF polymer matrix (i.e., unsubstituted phenolic hydroxyl groups) was shown to be strongly impacted by the pretreatment time and the recovery. Finally, a lignin-based wood adhesive was formulated by replacing 100% of the phenol with formic-acid-extracted lignin, which exhibited a dry shear strength exceeding a conventional PF adhesive. These findings suggest that both pretreatment and lignin extraction conditions can be tailored to yield lignins with properties targeted for this co-product application.en-UScopyright American Chemical Society 2022http://web.archive.org/web/20190502075603/http://pubs.acs.org/paragonplus/copyright/jpa_form_a.pdfligninwood adhesivep-coumaratebiorefinerycelluslosic biofuelsArticle