Catalytic Conversion of Fructose, Glucose, and Sucrose to 5-(Hydroxymethyl)furfural and Levulinic and Formic Acids in γ-Valerolactone As a Green Solvent

• DOI: 10.1021/cs401160y
• Publication Date: 2014-03-28T20:08:39Z
• Authors: Long Qi; Yiu Fung Mui; See Wing Lo; Matthew Y. Lui; Geoffrey R. Akien; István T. Horváth
• Keywords: Levulinic acid; Hydroxymethyl

The conversion of fructose, glucose, and sucrose to 5-(hydroxymethyl)furfural (HMF) levulinic acid (LA)/formic (FA) was investigated in detail using sulfuric as the catalyst γ-valerolactone (GVL) a green solvent. H2SO4/GVL/H2O system can be tuned produce either HMF or LA/FA by changing concentration thus allowing selective switching between products. Although best yields were around 75%, ranged from 50% 70%, depending on structure carbohydrates reaction parameters, including temperature, acid, carbohydrate concentrations. While fructose is much faster than behaves like 1:1 mixture indicating facile hydrolysis glycosidic bond sucrose. mechanism glucose GVL involves three intermediates: 1,6-anhydro-β-d-glucofuranose, 1,6-anhydro-β-d-glucopyranose, levoglucosenone.