Biochemical reactions in supercritical fluids

Abstract

Enzymatic catalysis has gained considerable attention in recent years as an efficient tool for synthesis of natural products, pharmaceuticals, fine chemicals, and food ingredients. The production of fine chemicals results in the generation of considerable volumes of waste, as the syntheses generally include a number of steps. The yield of each of these steps is usually 60% to 90%, but 10% is not unusual. Based on these data we can conclude that typically 1 kg of end product leads to the generation of 15 kg of wastes or more. Most generated wastes are solvents and by-products from solvents and intermediates. Therefore, ideally several reactions should be performed in water or in supercritical fluids.