Abstract
The adoption of biocatalysis in solvent-free systems is an alternative to establish a greener esters production. An interesting correlation between the acid:alcohol molar ratio and biocatalyst (immobilized lipase) loading in the optimization of ester syntheses in solvent-free systems had been observed and explored. A simple mathematical tool named Substrate-Enzyme Relation (SER) has been developed, indicating a range of reaction conditions that resulted in high conversions. Here, SER utility has been validated using data from the literature and experimental assays, totalizing 39 different examples of solvent-free enzymatic esterifications. We found a good correlation between the SER trends and reaction conditions that promoted high conversions on the syntheses of short, mid, or long-chain esters. Moreover, the predictions obtained with SER are coherent with thermodynamic and kinetics aspects of enzymatic esterification in solvent-free systems. SER is an easy-to-handle tool to predict the reaction behavior, allowing obtaining optimum reaction conditions with a reduced number of experiments, including the adoption of reduced biocatalysts loadings.
Highlights
As the Substrate-Enzyme Relation (SER) was described for synthesizing an aliphatic ester in Solvent-free systems (SFS), this study focuses on applying the SER for other aliphatic molecules in the same condition
This study shows that SER is an empiric mathematical relation that presents a reasonable agreement with the literature results for solvent-free enzymatic syntheses of aliphatic esters
Its main advantage is to indicate a range of conditions in which the equilibrium shift towards synthesis may be attained without inhibition of immobilized lipases
Summary
Publisher’s Note: MDPI stays neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations. Solvent-free systems (SFS) are becoming popular for enzymatic esterifications. These systems have many advantages because the reaction media is formed only by the reactants, increasing the volumetric productivity of the process and avoiding complex downstream and hazardous wastes [1,2,3]. The adoption of solvent-free systems may contribute to achieving the feasibility of biocatalytic ester syntheses on a large scale in both technical and economic aspects, in consonance with the principles of Green Chemistry
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