LAUSR

Production of biobased functional polymers from woody biomass is becoming increasingly important for biorefineries. We studied the direct production of vanillin and vanillic acid, which are key monomer components for thermostable polymers, from a softwood Japanese cedar by an alkaline copper oxide–peroxide reaction using microwave (MW) and conventional heating (CH) reactors. MW heating at 180 °C for 10 min produced vanillin and vanillic acid in yields nearly three times higher than those produced by conventional heating (10.1% vs 3.4%). The MW and CH experiments were precisely compared using the same heating conditions and the same reaction vessel. A cavity resonator (single-mode microwave) which can separate electric (E) and magnetic (H) fields were used for wood degradation. The results revealed that the reactions were accelerated by both fields with a slightly more prominent effect of electric fields (Emax). The activation energy of experiments under CH, MW-Emax, and MW-Hmax was calculated. The yield e...