**Author details**

process, especially biological pretreatment, which requires more than 7 days to remove lignin

The most important advantage of the irradiation process is that this process is very selective to the degradation of the biomass component, unlike chemical pretreatment that could degrade some part of cellulose and hemicellulose during the process [45]. On the other hand, this process also produced less inhibitor that could affect enzymatic saccharification and fermen‐ tation process. According to Bak et al. [43], there was no inhibitors produced from the irradiated biomass when the pretreatment was carried out using water as soaking buffer. Hence, could increase the enzymatic saccharification and fermentation process performance

Even though this irradiation pretreatment procedure is quite simple, it is undeniable that the high-energy consumption associated with it makes the process not preferable for implemen‐ tation on a commercial scale [40, 96]. Besides, this process requires a special reactor that could affect during large-scale process. For the large-scale pretreatment of biomass, a large micro‐ wave irradiator or reactor is required, which is costly, energy consuming, and limits its use in

There is a wide range of chemical composition distribution in tropical biomass and biofiber making these resources a great potential to be used for biofuel and other value added products. To convert these materials, it has to go through series of processes, and the most environment friendly and efficient method is important to ensure the feasibility of the product produced. Irradiation pretreatment has been reported to have more advantages on the biomass pretreat‐ ment because this process is environment friendly, it requires less chemical, and the process can be performed in a short period of time. Irradiation pretreatment such as gamma ray, electron beam, microwave, and ultrasonications proved able to disrupt cell wall structure and provide better access for enzymatic saccharification. Hence, this could increase biofuel production and other chemicals from the tropical biomass and biofiber generated from agroindustry. However, this process still requires high energy and it could give negative impact especially at the large-scale production. Thus, further research to attempt maximum perform‐ ance using low energy is very crucial to ensure the feasibility of the biofuel production from

The author, would like to thank for the financial support provided by University Sains

large-scale operations. This drawback hence also could increase the operational cost.

tropical biomass and biofiber using irradiation pretreatment.

Malaysia (USM) Short Term Research Grant 304/PTEKIND/6313194

material from the biomass [95].

348 Radiation Effects in Materials

for liquid biofuel production.

**8. Conclusions**

**Acknowledgements**

Mohd Asyraf Kassim1\*, H.P.S Abdul Khalil1 , Noor Aziah Serri1 , Mohamad Haafiz Mohamad Kassim1 , Muhammad Izzuddin Syakir1 , N.A. Sri Aprila2 and Rudi Dungani3

\*Address all correspondence to: asyrafkassim@usm.my

1 School of Industrial Technology, Universiti Sains Malaysia (USM), Penang, Malaysia

2 Department of Chemical Engineering, Engineering Faculty of Syiah Kuala University, Ban‐ da Aceh, Indonesia

3 School of Life Sciences and Technology, Institut Teknologi Bandung, Indonesia
