Appropriate lignocellulosic biomass processing strategies for efficient 2,3-butanediol production from biomass-derived sugars using Bacillus licheniformis DSM 8785

•A nonpathogenic organism was evaluated for 2,3-butanediol (BD) fermentation.•The results showed that BD can be efficiently produced using the nonpathogenic organism.•Mixed sugar medium was less efficient due to carbon catabolite repression.•Biomass hydrolyzate with high sugar concentration needs additional detoxification process.•Fed-batch process produced high BD titer (>10%, w/v) in glucose medium.

A nonpathogenic organism, Bacillus licheniformis DSM 8785, was evaluated for efficient 2,3- butanediol (BD) production from different sugar media. Productivities in glucose, xylose, and mixed-sugar (glucose:xylose = 1:2) media were 2.23, 1.58, and 0.91 g L−1 h−1, respectively. These were almost two-fold more than use of a more common BD producer, albeit a pathogenic organism, Klebsiella oxytoca ATCC 8724. Fermentation efficiency in the biomass hydrolyzates with 40 g/L of total sugar was as efficient as synthetic sugar with a similar sugar concentration, but not so in the hydrolyzates with 80 g/L of total sugar. The optimum fed-batch process in a glucose medium produced 103 g/L BD in the final fermentation broth, with yield and productivity of 0.47 g/g and 0.81 g L−1 h−1, respectively. Our study concluded that an efficient BD fermentation is possible using a nonpathogenic culture in a single-sugar medium; however, appropriate biomass processing strategies must be developed to produce separate streams of glucose and xylose from lignocellulosic biomass for efficient BD production. We, therefore, proposed a novel biomass processing strategy using a three-step pretreatment process to obtain separate streams of biomass extractives, cellulose hydrolyzate, and hemicellulose hydrolyzate. This information is pertinent for efficient BD production from biomass-derived sugar.