MECHANOCHEMICAL APPROACH TO SUSTAINABLE BENZYLIC ALCOHOLS OXIDATION

This work aims to present a new mechanochemical catalysed reaction that selectively oxidizes alcohols into carbonylic compounds. Although reactions of this kind are fundamental to the chemical industry, they do not meet the criteria of green chemistry[1]. Mechanochemistry is a tool that allows chemists to achieve sustainable chemical processes [2] and activate catalytic reactions[3]. Preliminary studies of this work have shown that p-OH-benzyl alcohol can be selectively oxidised into the corresponding aldehyde through a solid-state reaction with various copper-supported catalysts and TEMPO. The solid mixture of reagent and catalysts is placed in the milling vial and then it is subjected to ball milling. Then the product is extracted with a small amount of organic solvent. Approximately 80% conversion is obtained after 3 hours of milling (Figure 1). This method requires less energy and time than solution synthesis; in addition, it generates no byproducts. The green assessment[4,5,6] shows that this reaction methodology demonstrates superior green metrics compared to solution-phase synthesis with the same reagents.