Abstract
In the context of decarbonizing the economy, the utilization of biologically sourced feedstocks to produce replacements for petroleum-derived materials is becoming more urgent. Improving renewable biomass production and utilization is imperative for commercializing future biorefineries. Algae-derived biomass is a particularly promising feedstock thanks to its attractive oil content and composition; specifically, the high-value products in the unsaponifiable lipids have not been included in a conversion process. Here we demonstrate surfactant synthesis from a complex oil fraction as the hydrophobic donor moieties, yielding products that are similar to commercially available surfactants such as the linear alkyl benzene sulfonates. Unsaponifiable lipids extracted from algae were derivatized to non-ionic surfactants using a green chemical synthesis route based on a double esterification with succinic acid and polyethylene glycol. The in-depth molecular and structural surfactant characterization is included and indicates that the resulting properties fall between those of pure cholesterol and phytol used as surrogates for the reaction synthesis demonstration. This is the first demonstration of an effective and potentially high-value synthesis of functional surfactants with properties that can be tailored based on the relative composition of the resulting hydrocarbon alcohol components in the mixture. This novel green chemistry synthesis approach provides a route to high-value product synthesis from algae.
Highlights
A recent drive to decarbonize the economy has seen a push, primarily driven by consumers, to replace petrochemical surfactants and detergents with biobased alternatives
We demonstrate here for the first time the synthesis of renewable surfactants from the algae unsaponifiable lipid fraction, using an alternative, green, and less reactive chemical approach to ethoxylation
The synthesis reaction is based on the sequential esterification of succinic anhydride and polyethylene glycol of the hydroxyl functional groups of novel hydrophobic moieties
Summary
A recent drive to decarbonize the economy has seen a push, primarily driven by consumers, to replace petrochemical surfactants and detergents with biobased alternatives. To make a market impact with alternative biobased non-ionic surfactants, it is critical that both the surfactant properties and molecular composition approximate the target application. The biological feedstock for the hydrophobic moieties of the surfactants should be sustainably sourced, chemically well-characterized, and abundantly available. One such feedstock is algal biomass, derived from single-celled photosynthetic organisms, whose chemical composition can Surfactants From Unsaponifiable Lipids be optimized and tuned to provide a sustainable source of oleochemicals (Koutinas et al, 2014; Laurens et al, 2017)
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