Kecheng Li
Professor
Director of Graduate Studies
PhD (2003) Chemical Engineering, University of Toronto
MASc (1988), BSc Eng (1985) Chemical Engineering,
Shaanxi University of Science & Technology, Xi'an China
15 Dineen Dr.,
P.O. Box 4400
Rm E230, Head Hall
Fredericton, NB E3B 5A3 Canada
Tel: 506-453-4628 Fax: 506-453-3591
kecheng@unb.ca
Research Interests
Biorefining of Lignocellulose Biomass
Development of technologies and processes of pretreatment of biomass substrates for fuels and biochemicals production; Fundamental understanding of plant cell wall architecture and its recalcitrance to direct enzyme activity; Energy savings in the biomass pretreatment process, e.g., integration and synergy of chemical, mechanical, enzymatic processes in lignocellulosic hydrolysis; Inhibitor reduction in biomass processing; Lignin and hemicellulose products from a pretreatment process for value-added biochemical products.
Surface and Nano-scale Characterization of Biomass Materials
Development of surface and nano-scale characterization techniques for materials especially lignocellulose biomass materials with using AFM, FE-SEM, TEM, CLSM, XPS, and SIMS; Interaction forces between plant cells and between a plant cell and other chemicals and enzymes, e.g., non-conductive binding of enzymes by lignin, inter-fibre bonding forces in pN, interaction between fibres and fillers, and force mapping for surface chemical distribution; Techniques for in-situ observation of enzyme actions on lignocellulose material on a nano-scale with AFM; Pathways of enzyme actions in a cellulose hydrolysis process with observation of the progression of cell wall morphological alteration; Material properties of nano-cellulose fibres and a surface layer, e.g., G, E, and flexibility measurement.
Energy Savings in Wood Mechanical Pulping and Pulp Property Improvement
Development of biomechanical processes for mechanical and chemimechanical pulping; Energy saving in mechanical refining in relation to wood and wood cell wall changes due to prior chemical and biological modification; Flexibility of mechanical pulp fibres in relation to the bending stiffness of paper and paperboard, e.g. new techniques of measuring flexibility of lignin-containing mechanical fibres, network modeling of paper structure; Novel interfibre bonding measurement technique with AFM, and bonding forces among lignocellulose materials and chemicals and fillers, i.e., impact of lignin-containing fibres on paper network structure and strength.
