Selective catalytic dehydration of furfuryl alcohol to 2, 2′-difurfuryl ether using a polyoxometalate catalyst

Abstract

The spice flavour compound 2, 2′-difurfuryl ether (DFE) is widely utilised in the food industry as it has a coffee-like, nutty, earthy, mushroom-like odour. However, despite intensive research efforts, to date, an environmentally friendly and practical synthetic preparation technique for 2, 2′-difurfuryl ether is still unavailable. Here, we investigate a new approach using polyoxometalate catalysts to selectively catalytically dehydrate furfuryl alcohol to 2, 2′-difurfuryl ether. We have successfully applied this methodology using the polyoxometalate (POMs) catalyst {[(CH3CH2CH2CH2)4N]2[SMo12O40]} to produce 2,2′-difurfuryl ether in a 30.86% isolated yield.