Fractionation and characterization of ball‐milled and enzyme lignins from abaca fibre

An Erratum has been published for this article in Journal of the Science of Food and Agriculture 79(15) 1999, 2122. Ball‐milled and enzyme lignins were produced from abaca fibre via ball milling for 6 days followed by cellulase treatment for 3 days. The crude lignin preparations were fractionated into milled lignin (ML), enzyme lignin (EL), hemicellulose‐rich milled lignin (HRML), and lignin‐rich enzyme lignin (LREL) fractions using a two‐step precipitation method instead of a traditional ether precipitation procedure. The yield and chemical composition of the resulting lignin samples are reported. The ML and EL fractions contained low amounts of associated neutral sugars (2.0–3.3%) and uronic acids (1.4–1.5%), and showed relatively low average molecular weights (2500–2660), while the LREL and HRML fractions contained large amounts of bound polysaccharides (35.6–38.3%), and showed high molecular weights (8800–25000). The four lignin fractions are composed of a large proportion of syringyl units with fewer guaiacyl and p‐hydroxyphenyl units. The ML is mainly composed of β–O–4 ether bonds between the lignin structural units. The less common β–β, β–5 and 5–5′ carbon–carbon linkages are also present in the lignin molecules. It was found that uronic acids and 41–63% of p‐coumaric acids are esterified to lignin in the three lignin‐rich fractions of ML, EL and LREL. This level increased to over 90% in the hemicellulose‐rich fraction of HRML. For ferulic acids, 92–97% were found to be etherified to lignin in the three lignin‐rich fractions of ML, EL and LREL, while in the hemicellulose‐rich fraction of HRML this reduced to only 13%, suggesting that a majority of the ferulic acids are esterified to hemicelluloses or lignin in this fraction. © 1999 Society of Chemical Industry