Patent ID: 7875444

Claim:
A method for enhancing ethanol yield from a lignocellulosic biomass in a bioconversion process, said method comprising: treating said biomass, which comprises a lignin component and a cellulose component, with a composition containing a lignin-blocking proteinaceous material to provide a reaction mixture containing a treated lignin component, wherein the lignin-blocking proteinaceous material is selected from the group consisting of fish processing waste, meat processing waste, grain processing waste, sugar processing waste, spoiled or expired food stock, algal protein, soybean protein, whey protein, and combinations thereof; adding a hydrolyzing enzyme to the reaction mixture to hydrolyze the cellulose component of the biomass into carbohydrates; fermenting the carbohydrates in the reaction mixture in the presence of a sugar-to-ethanol converting microorganism; and extracting ethanol from the fermented reaction mixture.