Lignin, a major component of lignocellulosic biomass, is crucial to plant growth and development but is a major impediment to efficient biomass utilization in various processes. Valorizing lignin is increasingly realized as being essential. However, rapid condensation of lignin during acidic extraction leads to the formation of recalcitrant condensed units that, along with similar units and structural heterogeneity in native lignin, drastically limits product yield and selectivity. Catechyl lignin (C-lignin), which is essentially a benzodioxane homopolymer without condensed units, might represent an ideal lignin for valorization, as it circumvents these issues. We discovered that C-lignin is highly acid-resistant. Hydrogenolysis of C-lignin resulted in the cleavage of all benzodioxane structures to produce catechyl-type monomers in near-quantitative yield with a selectivity of 90% to a single monomer.

中文翻译：

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“理想的木质素”有利于生物质的充分利用。

木质素是木质纤维素生物质的主要成分，对植物生长和发育至关重要，但也是各种过程中有效利用生物质的主要障碍。人们越来越认识到木质素的价值至关重要。然而，在酸提取过程中木质素的快速缩合导致形成顽固的缩合单元，这些单元与天然木质素中的相似单元和结构异质性一起，极大地限制了产品产量和选择性。儿茶基木质素（C-木质素）本质上是一种没有缩合单元的苯并二恶烷均聚物，可能代表一种理想的增值木质素，因为它避免了这些问题。我们发现C-木质素具有高度耐酸性。C-木质素的氢解导致所有苯并二恶烷结构裂解，以接近定量的产率生产儿茶基型单体，对单一单体的选择性为 90%。