“…The minimum transmittance peaks of B at 3411, 1427, 1323, 1163, 1053 and 1037 cm À1 were shifted to 3448,1421,1315,1159,1063 and 1022 cm À1 , respectively, for MMB (Figure not shown) (Gurgel et al, 2008a). Besides these changes observed, the treatment of the sugarcane bagasse with NaOH 5 mol/L caused the dissolution of part of the lignin (López et al, 2000) and the polyoses, which justified the observed mass loss. FTIR (Figure not shown) showed the disappearance of the characteristic band of lignin at 1604 cm À1 , which corresponds to the aromatic skeletal modes, along with other characteristic bands of lignin and polyoses at 1736, 1514 and 1254 cm À1 , which correspond to the carbonyl stretching of ketone, skeletal modes and C-O-C stretching, respectively (Bilba & Ouensanga, 1996).…”