Technological advances in the field of life sciences have led to discovery of organisms that live in harsh environmental conditions referred to as extremophiles. These organisms have adapted themselves to thrive in extreme habitat giving these organisms an advantage over conventional mesophilic organisms in various industrial applications. Extremozymes produced by these extremophiles have high tolerance to inhospitable environmental conditions making them an ideal enzyme system for various industrial processes. A notable application of these extremophiles and extremozymes is their use in the degradation of recalcitrant lignocellulosic biomass and application in biorefineries. For maximum utilization of the trapped carbon source from this obstinate biomass, pretreatment is a necessary step that requires various physiochemical and enzymatic treatments. From search for novel extremophiles and extremozymes to development of various genetic and protein engineering techniques, investigation on extremozymes with enhanced stability and efficiency is been done. Since extremozymes are easily calibrated to work under such conditions, they have become an emerging topic in the research field of biofuel production. The review discusses the various extremozymes that play an important role in lignocellulose degradation along with recent studies on their molecular and genetic evolution for industrial application and production of biofuels and various value-added products.
Keywords: Biofuels; Biorefineries; CAZymes; Extremophiles; Extremozymes; Lignocellulose.