Solvent-Free Isoamyl Acetate Production via Enzymatic Esterification

Abstract

Isoamyl acetate is an organic compound which is mainly used as flavor additive in food industries. Traditionally, the food flavor has been produced by extraction from plants, followed by chemical synthesis route which then shifted to biocatalytic route due to consumer ’ s awareness and inclination toward natural products. This study was carried out to examine the reaction synthesis between acetic anhydride and isoamyl alcohol in the presence of Candida antarctica Lipase-B (CALB) as a catalyst in solvent-free system (SFS). Results show that two reactions took place between acetic anhydride and isoamyl alcohol. The effect of different reaction parameters on the final yield of isoamyl acetate and the optimization of process parameters using a statistical tool were also investigated with response surface methodology (RSM). It was found that the optimum isoamyl acetate yield is at reaction temperature 30 (cid:1) C, acid/alcohol molar ratio 0.10, and enzyme loading 4.14%. The regression coefficient for optimization based on RSM was 0.9961. Errors resulted from model validation is less than 1% and is acceptable for real-life application. RSM model and first principle model were selected to determine the reaction kinetics and yield of reaction for isoamyl acetate. The results showed that RSM model provides a good predication of the esterification system with R 2 value of 0.90.