Liquid ? liquid extraction technology for resource recovery: Applications, potential, and perspectives

Biorefinery of biomass for value-added products and biofuel plays an important role in the sustainable global bioeconomy. Among various biorefinery processes and platforms, effective separation technologies are key to the economical production of value-added products and biofuel from biomass at a low cost. Amid the several separation technologies available, liquid-liquid extraction (LLE) has been shown to play a vital role in the separation and purification of bioproducts in biomass biorefining processes and has demonstrated many advantages, as compared to other separation technologies. LLE has become a potential technology for biomass biorefinery. Lab scale and pilot-scale studies of LLE technology in biorefinery have been reported. This review focuses on the applications of LLE technologies in various processes of biomass biorefinery, including extraction and separation of biochemical materials and biofuels from aqueous mixtures and removing fermentation inhibitors from biomass hydrolysates. This review paper aims to offer an up-to-date discussion of the applications, recent progress, potential, and future research directions of LLE in biomass biorefineries. LLE technology is a promising separation technology for biomass biorefineries with a bright future.

Automated summary

Liquid-liquid extraction (LLE) technology in biomass biorefinery has shown many advantages in the separation and purification of bioproducts, becoming a potential technology for biomass biorefinery with a promising future.