Enzymatic Synthesis of Caprylic Caprylate in an Organic Solvent

The synthesis of caprylic caprylate catalyzed by lipase from porcine pancreas in an organic solvent was carried out to explore the effects of organic solvent type,reaction temperature,amount of added water,reaction time,lipase amount,substrate concentration and caprylic acid-to-caprylic alcohol ratio on caprylic acid conversion.The optimum organic solvent for caprylic caprylate synthesis was n-hexane.Reaction temperature of 45 ℃,amount of added water of 29 μ L,caprylic acid-tocaprylic alcohol ratio of 1:1.2-1:1.5,caprylic acid concentration of 0.23-0.33 mol/L,lipase concentration of 2.314 g/L were found optimum.Under these optimized conditions,the conversion ratio of caprylic acid was 98.12%.In addition,the structure of synthesized product was characterized by IR,1H NMR and 13C NMR.This synthesis method can yield a high conversion ratio of caprylic acid under mild reaction conditions.