ALEXANDRIA, Va., July 16 -- United States Patent no. 12,358,939, issued on July 15, was assigned to Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation (Madison, Wis.).
"Method to solubilize biomass under mild conditions" was invented by Fachuang Lu (Madison, Wis.) and John Ralph (Madison, Wis.).
According to the abstract* released by the U.S. Patent & Trademark Office: "A method of completely dissolving lignocellulosic biomass. The method includes the steps of dissolving a sample of biomass in an aqueous solution of strong acid and an amine-thiol to yield a first solution. A method for measuring lignin concentration in biomass via absorbance of the first solution at a wavelength of about 283 nm by comparing the measured absorbance to a standard curve o...