Thermo Fisher Scientific Inc. has developed a rapid ion chromatogaphy (IC) method to determine the common sugars in samples from solutions used for biofuel production.

The method described in Application Note 282: Rapid and Sensitive Determination of Biofuel Sugars by Ion Chromatography requires minimal sample pretreatment and uses a Dionex CarboPac SA10 anion-exchange column with electrolytically generated hydroxide eluent and high-performance anion-exchange chromatography with pulsed amperometric detection (HPAE-PAD).

Corn stover, a common feedstock for biofuel alcohol production, consists of the leaves and stalks of maize plants left after harvesting. It is critical to determine carbohydrates during biofuel alcohol production to ensure process yield and product quality. The carbohydrates in biomass samples are often quantified by high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) using refractive index detection. The refractive-index-based method is not specific, and could have interferences from other compounds in the complex biomass matrices.

This application note and many others can be found at www.thermoscientific.com/dionex under the Documents tab.


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