Clean Production of 2,3,5-Trimethylhydroquinone Using Peroxidase-Based Catalyst

Abstract

The selective oxidation of organic compounds to obtain vitamins is one of the key processes in chemistry and biotechnology. The use of toxic compounds such as chromium and manganese oxides for these purposes strongly affects the environment. We propose a novel bio-catalyst supported on magnetically separable nanoparticles based on the immobilized peroxidase. Biocatalysts based on immobilized enzymes received considerable attention due to important applications in syntheses of value-added chemicals, pharmaceuticals and drug intermediates with great catalytic efficiency and high yields of target molecules. In this work, we studied the oxidation of 2,3,6-trimethylphenol to 2,3,5-trimethylhydroquinone (an intermediate of vitamin E) using hydrogen peroxide. The effects of initial substrate concentration, temperature, and pH were studied. The optimum conditions for the process of oxidation 2,3,6-trimethylphenol in the presence of magnetically separable biocatalyst were found: initial substrate concentration – 1.5 mmol/L; temperature – 40 °C; pH – 6.5. The developed biocatalyst showed high activity and selectivity in 2,3,6-trimethylphenol oxidation to 2,3,5-trimethylhydroquinone.