Industrial processes silicon purification

According to Coimbra et solvents play a central role in the majority of chemical and pharmaceutical industrial processes. The most used method to obtain artemisinin (1) from A. annua is through the use of organic solvents such as toluene, hexane, cyclohexane, ethanol, chloroform and petroleum ether. Rodrigues et al described a low-cost and industrial scaled procedure that enables artemisinin (1) enhanced yields by using inexpensive and easy steps. Serial extraction techniques allowed a reduction of 65% in solvent consumption. Moreover, the use of ethanol for compound extraction is safer when compared to other solvents. Flash column pre-purification employing silicon dioxide (Zeosil ) as stationary phase provided an enriched artemisinin (1) fraction that precipitated in hexane/ethyl acetate (85/15, v/v) solution. These results indicate the feasibility of producing artemisinin (1) at final cost lowered by almost threefold when compared to classical procedures. 

Crystallization is mainly used for separation as an alternative to distillation, if the involved compounds are thermally unstable (e.g., acrylic acid), have a low or practically no vapor pressure (like salts), if the boiling points are similar, or if the system forms an azeotrope. Crystallization is used for the production and purification of various organic chemicals ranging from bulk chemicals (p-xylene and naphthalene) to fine chemicals like pharmaceuticals (e.g., proteins). Further examples of industrial crystallization processes are sugar refining, salt production for the food industry, and silicon crystal wafer production. 

Silicones are made from silicon and methyl chloride in a process known as the direct reaction or direct process. This reaction yields methyl chlorosilanes. They are distilled for purification and the dimethyldichlorosilane is hydrolyzed to give PDMS. This product can be formulated into thousands of different products, which are sold to every major industrial segment. 

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