Recent advances on physical technologies for the pretreatment of food waste and lignocellulosic residues

Abstract

The complete deployment of a bio-based economy is essential to meet the United Nations’ Sustainable Development

Goals from the 2030 Agenda. In this context, food waste and lignocellulosic residues are considered lowcost

feedstocks for obtaining industrially attractive products through biological processes. The effective conversion

of these raw materials is, however, still challenging, since they are recalcitrant to bioprocessing and must

be first treated to alter their physicochemical properties and ease the accessibility to their structural components.

Among the full pallet of pretreatments, physical methods are recognised to have a high potential to transform

food waste and lignocellulosic residues. This review provides a critical discussion about the recent advances on

milling, extrusion, ultrasound, and microwave pretreatments. Their mechanisms and modes of application are

analysed and the main drawbacks and limitations for their use at an industrial scale are discussed