Fig. 5

Combinatorial assessment of cell wall structure and investigation of microbial CAZyme function. The integration of analytical methods can be implemented to provide a comprehensive experimental workflow to improve bioconversion of agriculture residues. Crop residues can be studied prior to or after processing using total cell wall analysis. Information on the structure of waste residues can be compared to starting material to determine recalcitrant structures that are limiting the efficiency of bioconversion. The microbial ecosystem of biodigesters can be studied using -omics techniques, such as metagenomics, metatranscriptomics, and metaproteomics, to define the structure and function at the community, microbe, and CAZyme levels. Information gathered using these techniques can inform optimized conditions or identify lacking catalytic functions in the reaction cascade. Microbial communities, microorganisms, and CAZymes can be deployed back into production processes to augment inefficent or absent catalytic reactions and improve biofuel production. Surface representation of enzyme structure (white) was generated using PyMOL [229] (PDB ID: 2CKR), with cellotetrose ligand illustrated in sticks (blue)