Chemistry Reference
In-Depth Information
Fig. 14.
8
Uses for lactic acid.
Scheme 14.20
commercial building block from biotechnology
[127]. Like levulinic acid, succinic acid is another
example of a platform chemical. Succinic acid has
been used traditionally in speciality applications
[128] and is produced at a level of 1.5 ¥ 10
4
t year
-1
.
New process technology currently being scaled up
suggests that it would be useful for the production
of much larger volume materials such as 1,4-butane-
diol (BDO), tetrahydrofuran, g-butyrolactone and
N
-
methyl pyrrolidinone [129]. These products have a
combined market of over 2.75 ¥ 10
5
t year
-1
.
Many attempts have been made to develop a fer-
mentation for the production of succinic acid from
renewable feedstocks [130] but none of these have
this herbicide will be one of the largest scale exam-
ples of a biocatalytic process (Scheme 14.21) [126].
Reaction of a racemic amine with methoxyacetic
acid in the presence of the lipase gives a selective
amidation of the unwanted enantiomer. The remain-
ing optically pure amine then is converted to the
herbicide. Hydrolysis of the amide gives a free amine
that can be racemised and recycled to the initial bio-
chemical step. Eventually, very high conversions of
the starting amine are realised.
Succinic acid has been recognised as a possible
