Saccharomyces Cerevisiae as a Biocatalyst for Different Carbonyl Group under Green Condition

Abstract

In this research saccharomyces cerevisiae (baker’s yeast) was used as a cheap, readily accessible, selective, efficient, and green biocatalyst in a chemo selective reduction of carbonyl group to hydroxyl group. In this green procedure three substrates e.g. (3-(3nitrophenyl)aziridin-2-yl)-1-phenyl-methanone, pyruvate ester, and 2-acetyl-γ-butyrolactone were reduced to their corresponding reduced compounds in the presence of saccharomyces cerevisiae at ambient temperature in aqueous media. It was worthy to note that ketone groups were chemo-selectively reduced, while ester and lactone groups remained unchanged. Moreover, in this procedure, chemo selective bioreduction of ketone group to hydroxyl group can be performed by coenzyme NADPH in saccharomyces cerevisiae (baker’s yeast) which is recyclable in water, as a green solvent, while this recyclization cannot occur in non-aqueous systems. The structure of products was confirmed by IR and 1 H NMR spectra.