PAPER making! g! FROM THE PUBLISHERS OF PAPER TECHNOLOGY INTERNATIONAL ® Volume 11, Number 3, 2025
PAPER CHEMICALS “Chimeric enzymes in the pulp and paper making industry: Current developments”, Abdullah Arsalan, Yuvaraj Ravikumar, Xinrui Tang, Zijing Cao, Mei Zhao, Wenjing Sun & Xianghui Qi, Biotechnology Advances, 79, March–April 2025, 108530. The pulp and paper (P&P) industry plays a vital role in supporting the social and economic progress of a country by supplying essential commodities. Conventional P&P processing often consumes significant energy and use chemical agents to produce hazardous intermediates. The use of enzymes in the P&P industry has significantly reduced both the chemical and energy demands during processing. A variety of enzyme combination cocktails are used to perform multiple functions in a single step, but often fail to operate synergistically because of significant differences in operational conditions. This lack of synergy under various operating conditions highlights the need for engineered chimeric enzymes. Moreover, enzyme engineering approaches enable enzymes to perform catalysis in sub-optimal environment. Enzymes have been engineered to improve their catalytic properties and enhance operational stability. Designing multifunctional or chimeric enzymes can function simultaneously across diverse operational conditions. Chimeric enzymes enable effective synergistic action of multiple enzymes in the P&P industry. This review aims to provide clear insights into the selective development of chimeric enzymes using enzyme engineering approaches for their effective use in the P&P industry. PAPERMAKING “Understanding Sizing Conditions with Alkenyl Succinic Anhydride: Experimental Analysis of pH and Anionic Trash Catcher Effects on Softwood Kraft Pulp”, Jorge Franco, Juan Carlos Bastidas, Hasan Jameel & Ronalds Gonzalez, BioResources , 2025, 20(2), p4378. A 32 factorial experimental design was conducted to evaluate the effects of pH and anionic trash catcher (ATC) dosage on Cobb number (1 min), cationic demand, and conductivity in softwood kraft pulp sizing with Alkenyl Succinic Anhydride (ASA). Results indicated that acidic conditions tended to enhance ASA's reaction with cellulose, leading to superior hydrophobicity (Cobb number, 1 min = 23g/m² at pH 4.0 and 121μeq/L cationic demand). Statistical analysis confirmed that pH exerted a stronger influence on ASA performance (p-value 2.0x10-7) compared to ATC dosage (p-value 0.0297), while conductivity had minimal effect. The findings suggest that optimizing ASA application in acid conditions improves water resistance, reducing reliance on high ATC dosages. This study provides valuable insights into ASA application strategies for papermaking, particularly in furnishes that do not require alkaline conditions to retain fillers, by optimizing wet-end chemistry control for enhanced sizing efficiency. PULP & PULPING “Optimization of the ionoSolv process for the preservation of pulp fibre dimensions”, Shuyu Luan, Suhaib Nisar, Jonathan Phipps, Antonio Ovejero-Pérez, Jason P. Hallett & Pedro Verdía Barbará, Industrial Crops and Products , 236, November 2025, 121996. The pulping industry, dominated by century-old technologies, is highly polluting, making imperative finding more environmentally friendly alternatives. The ionoSolv process, based on the use of low-cost protic ionic liquids, is one of the most promising methods to fractionate lignocellulose with low ecological impact. However, this process has been only optimized to produce sugar-derived chemicals, where fibre quality is not a key factor. Earlier studies have shown the detrimental effect of the standard ionoSolv conditions on fibre length, which renders them unsuitable for fibre applications, including the production of paper. For the first time, this study shows the optimization of the ionoSolv fractionation of Miscanthus to preserve key fibre properties of the pulps, namely fibre dimensions, degree of polymerization and relative molecular mass, while maintaining optimal purity. Different temperatures (150ºC
Technical Abstracts
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