Green Synthesis of Veratraldehyde Using Potassium Promoted Lanthanum–Magnesium Mixed Oxide Catalyst

Abstract

Veratraldehyde is an important chemical used in perfumery, agrochemical, and pharmaceutical industries. Current processes of manufacture of veratraldehyde use homogeneous catalysts, which make them highly polluting, creating problems of disposal of effluents and product purity. In the current work, veratraldehyde was synthesized from O-alkylation of vanillin with an environmentally benign reagent, dimethyl carbonate. A series of potassium loaded La2O3–MgO were prepared by the incipient wetness impregnation method, and their performance was evaluated vis-a-vis MgO, La2O3, La2O3–MgO, and a series of 1–4 wt % K/La2O3–MgO. All catalysts were characterized by different techniques, such as N2 adsorption/desorption, XRD, TGA-DSC, FT-IR, CO2-TPD, and SEM techniques. The effect of different loadings (1–4 wt %) of potassium on La2O3–MgO was studied, among which 2 wt % K/La2O3–MgO showed the best activity and selectivity due to high dispersion of potassium and high basicity in comparison with the rest. The activity ...