The Enhancement Origin of Antioxidant Property of Carboxylated Lignin Isolated from Herbaceous Biomass Using the Maleic Acid Hydrotropic Fractionation

Abstract

Lignin is endowed with antioxidant activity due to its diverse chemical structure. It is necessary to explore the relationship between antioxidant activity and the chemical structure of the lignin to develop its high-value utilization. Herein, we employed maleic acid (MA) as a hydrotropic agent to preferably isolate the lignin from distinct herbaceous sources (wheat straw and switchgrass) under atmospheric pressure conditions. The resultant acid hydrotropic lignin (AHL) isolated from wheat straw exhibited high radical scavenging rates, up to 98% toward DPPH and 94% toward ABTS. Further investigations indicated that during the MA hydrotropic fractionation (MAHF) process, lignin was carboxylated by MA at γ-OH of the side-chain, providing additional antioxidant activity from the carboxy group. It was also found that the radical scavenging rate of AHL has a positive correlation with carboxyl, phenolic hydroxyl contents, and the S–G (syringyl–guaiacyl) ratio, which could be realized by increasing the MAHF severity. Overall, this work underlies the enhancement origin of the antioxidant property of lignin, which will facilitate its application in biological fields as an efficient, cheap, and renewable antioxidant additive.