Sulfonic acid heterogeneous catalysts for dehydration of C6-monosaccharides to 5-hydroxymethylfurfural in dimethyl sulfoxide

Sulfonic acid-functionalized heterogeneous catalysts have been evaluated in the catalytic dehydration of C-6 monosaccharides into 5-hydroxymethylfurfural (HMF) using dimethyl sulfoxide (DMSO) as solvent. Sulfonic commercial resin Amberlyst-70 was the most active catalyst, which was ascribed to its higher concentration of sulfonic acid sites as compared with the other catalysts, and it gave 93 mol% yield of HMF from fructose in 1 h. With glucose as the starting material, which is a much more difficult reaction, the reaction conditions (time, temperature, and catalyst loading) were optimized for Amberlyst-70 by a response surface methodology, which gave a maximum HMF yield of 33 mol% at 147 C with 23 wt% catalyst loading based on glucose and 24 h reaction time. DMSO promotes the dehydration of glucose into anhydroglucose, which acts as a reservoir of the substrate to facilitate the production of HMF by reducing side reactions. Catalyst reuse without a regeneration treatment showed a gradual but not very significant decay in catalytic activity. (c) 2014, Dalian Institute of Chemical Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences.Published by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.