I am working on to find out some simple methods for Extracting hemicellulose from agro-waste. I am getting yellowish colour filtrate after filtration of the treated agro-waste. I want to characterise if there is any hemicellulose content in the filtrate, please suggest me some simple characterization technique to do that.
The norme Tappi 203 determine alpha, beta y gamma cellulose in the pulp, for delignified pulps only. In Spain, the norme UNE 57086 is used to determine pentonsans in pulp, wich is not the same of hemicellulose but is similar.
You can use HPLC for sugar content determination.
If Oligosugar determination process is not facilitated in your laboratory, you can digest the hemicellulose with 72% H2SO4 in autoclave at 121 oC for 1 h . Here you will get the monomer and lignin precipitation. By filtration you will get the hemicellulose which you can used for HPLC analysis.
