Bioprospecting for Novel Fungal Hemicellulases for Hemicellulose Degradation: Recent Advances, Applications, and Future Directions

Hemicellulose is the second most abundant carbohydrate in plant biomass and can be degraded by a variety of hemicellulolytic fungi. Hemicellulolytic fungi harbour hemicellulase enzymes that catalyse the breakdown of hemicellulose into simple sugars and oligosaccharides. Hemicellulases have several industrial applications in food, feed, bioethanol, pulp and paper, pharmaceuticals, and beverage-producing industries. There is little information on bioprospecting techniques for hemicellulolytic fungi. Therefore, the objectives of th is chapter are to explore the vast diversity of hemicellulolytic fungi, harness recent advances in the field, explore their applications, and define future directions for research. Traditional and cutting-edge molecular approaches have been used to isolate and identify hemicellulolytic fungi from various environmental sources. It is possible to identify novel hemicellulase genes and hemicellulose utilisation pathways for commercial applications using advanced molecular methods such as whole genome sequencing and comparative genomics, metagenomics, transcriptomics, and proteomics. There is a potential for fungal hemicellulases to improve industrial processes such as hemicellulose degradation, biofuel production, and prebiotic synthesis. Bioprospecting for new fungal hemicellulases, hemicellulase physiological control, novel inducers, different fungal strains or enzyme mixtures, gene cloning, and nanobiotechnology applications are all exciting prospects in hemicellulolytic enzyme research. Developing an ecologically friendly and long-term approach for bioprospecting fungi for hemicellulose degradation into value-added products such as ethanol and prebiotics is necessary.