Lignin
Lignin is the third major component in biomass, which is a crosslinked macromolecular material based on phenylpropanoid monomer units
Figure 4.8 A representative section of the lignin structure. |
p-coumaryl alcohol, coniferyl alcohol (guaiacyl), and sinapyl alcohol (syringyl). Typical molecular masses of isolated lignins are in the range 1000-20,000 g/mol, but the degree of polymerization in nature is difficult to measure since lignin is invariably fragments during extraction and consists of several types of substructures which repeat in an apparently random manner. A representative section of the lignin structure is shown in Figure 4.8.