Water immiscible solvents

Interfdci l Composite Membra.nes, A method of making asymmetric membranes involving interfacial polymerization was developed in the 1960s. This technique was used to produce reverse osmosis membranes with dramatically improved salt rejections and water fluxes compared to those prepared by the Loeb-Sourirajan process (28). In the interfacial polymerization method, an aqueous solution of a reactive prepolymer, such as polyamine, is first deposited in the pores of a microporous support membrane, typically a polysulfone ultrafUtration membrane. The amine-loaded support is then immersed in a water-immiscible solvent solution containing a reactant, for example, a diacid chloride in hexane. The amine and acid chloride then react at the interface of the two solutions to form a densely cross-linked, extremely thin membrane layer. This preparation method is shown schematically in Figure 15. The first membrane made was based on polyethylenimine cross-linked with toluene-2,4-diisocyanate (28). The process was later refined at FilmTec Corporation (29,30) and at UOP (31) in the United States, and at Nitto (32) in Japan. 

Figure 4a represents interfacial polymerisation encapsulation processes in which shell formation occurs at the core material—continuous phase interface due to reactants in each phase diffusing and rapidly reacting there to produce a capsule shell (10,11). The continuous phase normally contains a dispersing agent in order to faciUtate formation of the dispersion. The dispersed core phase encapsulated can be water, or a water-immiscible solvent. The reactant(s) and coreactant(s) in such processes generally are various multihmctional acid chlorides, isocyanates, amines, and alcohols. For water-immiscible core materials, a multihmctional acid chloride, isocyanate or a combination of these reactants, is dissolved in the core and a multihmctional amine(s) or alcohol(s) is dissolved in the aqueous phase used to disperse the core material. For water or water-miscible core materials, the multihmctional amine(s) or alcohol(s) is dissolved in the core and a multihmctional acid chloride(s) or isocyanate(s) is dissolved in the continuous phase. Both cases have been used to produce capsules. 

Because almost any diacid can be leaddy converted to the acid chloride, this reaction is quite versatile and several variations have been developed. In the interfacial polymerization method the reaction occurs at the boundary of two phases one contains a solution of the acid chloride in a water-immiscible solvent and the other is a solution of the diamine in water with an inorganic base and a surfactant (48). In the solution method, only one phase is present, which contains a solution of the diamine and diacid chloride. An organic base is added as an acceptor for the hydrogen chloride produced in the reaction (49). Following any of these methods of preparation, the polymer is exposed to water and the acid chloride end is converted to a carboxyhc acid end. However, it is very difficult to remove all traces of chloride from the polymer, even with repeated washings with a strong base. 

The most frequendy used technique to shift the equiUbrium toward peptide synthesis is based on differences in solubiUty of starting materials and products. Introduction of suitable apolar protective groups or increase of ionic strength decreases the product solubiUty to an extent that often allows neady quantitative conversions. Another solubiUty-controUed technique is based on introduction of a water-immiscible solvent to give a two-phase system. Products preferentially partition away from the reaction medium thereby shifting the equiUbrium toward peptide synthesis. 

Removal of acids from water-immiscible solvents by washing with aqueous alkali, sodium carbonate or sodium bicarbonate. 

The trihydrate which is obtained in high yields, is relatively insoluble in water, possesses high biological stability and can be obtained by contacting, at a temperature not above 60°C, an acid addition salt of D-(-)-a-aminobenzylpenicillin with an amine in a water-immiscible solvent containing at least 3 mols of water per mol of such penicillin. 

In a two-phase system (Figure 2.5c), the organic (water immiscible) solvent may be used as product extractant. In addition, recirculation of the organic phase can serve to transfer oxygen and to mix the aqueous phase. 

The reaction systems used for modification of triglycerides usually consist of a lipase catalyst and a small amount of water dispersed in a bulk organic phase containing the reactants and, if required, a water immiscible solvent. The small amount of water in the reaction system partitions between the catalyst and the bulk organic phase. 

The steroid-loaded formulations are prepared by a patented solvent evaporation process (45,46). Basically, the wall-forming polymer and the steix>id are added to a volatile, water-immiscible solvent. The dispersion or solution is added to an aqueous solution to form an oil-in-water emulsion. The volatile solvent is then removed to afford solid microparticles. The microparticles are usually subd vided with sieves to isolate fractions of the desired diameters. It is i nper-ative that a reliable and reproducible microencapsulation procedure be used to fabricate long-acting formulations. 

Dried or freeze dried samples can be extracted with water-immiscible solvents such as EtOAc or diethyl ether. For quantitative extraction, dried samples are preferably rehydrated at different times for example, 5 to 10 min for dried mangoes, 30 min for lyophihzed red peppers and pasta. Rehydration is followed by extraction with acetone or MeOH. Bixin and norbixin from a mix dry powder of annatto and com can quantitatively be extracted with MeOH followed by acetone. In order to improve pigment recovery, extruded foods require pre-digestion with enzymes to liberate the pigment from the matrix. ... 

The concept of extractive reaction, which was conceived over 40 years ago, has connections with acid hydrolysis of pentosans in an aqueous medium to give furfural, which readily polymerizes in the presence of an acid. The use of a water-immiscible solvent, such as tetralin allows the labile furfural to be extracted and thus prevents polymerization, increases the yield, and improves the recovery procedures. In the recent past an interesting and useful method has been suggested by Rivalier et al. (1995) for acid-catalysed dehydration of hexoses to 5-hydroxy methyl furfural. Here, a new solid-liquid-liquid extractor reactor has been suggested with zeolites in protonic form like H-Y-faujasite, H-mordenite, H-beta, and H-ZSM-5, in suspension in the aqueous phase and with simultaneous extraction of the intermediate product with a solvent, like methyl Aobutyl ketone, circulating countercurrently. 

MEEKC is a CE mode similar to MEKC, based on the partitioning of compounds between an aqueous and a microemulsion phase. The buffer solution consists of an aqueous solution containing nanometer-sized oil droplets as a pseudo-stationary phase. The most widely used microemulsion is made up of heptane as a water-immiscible solvent, SDS as a surfactant and 1-butanol as a cosurfactant. Surfactants and cosurfactants act as stabilizers at the surface of the droplet. 

The predominant RO membranes used in water applications include cellulose polymers, thin film oomposites (TFCs) consisting of aromatic polyamides, and crosslinked polyetherurea. Cellulosic membranes are formed by immersion casting of 30 to 40 percent polymer lacquers on a web immersed in water. These lacquers include cellulose acetate, triacetate, and acetate-butyrate. TFCs are formed by interfacial polymerization that involves coating a microporous membrane substrate with an aqueous prepolymer solution and immersing in a water-immiscible solvent containing a reactant [Petersen, J. Memhr. Sol., 83, 81 (1993)]. The Dow FilmTec FT-30 membrane developed by Cadotte uses 1-3 diaminobenzene prepolymer crosslinked with 1-3 and 1-4 benzenedicarboxylic acid chlorides. These membranes have NaCl retention and water permeability claims. 

Lipophilicity is a molecular property expressing the relative affinity of solutes for an aqueous phase and an organic, water-immiscible solvent. As such, lipophilicity encodes most of the intermolecular forces that can take place between a solute and a solvent, and represents the affinity of a molecule for a lipophilic environment. This parameter is commonly measured by its distribution behavior in a biphasic system, described by the partition coefficient of the species X, P. Thermodynamically, is defined as a constant relating the activity of a solute in two immiscible phases at equilibrium [111,112]. By convention, P is given with the organic phase as numerator, so that a positive value for log P reflects a preference for the lipid phase ... 

Probably the most common distillation method used as a form of sample preparation for chromatographic analysis is steam distillation [31,32]. Solvent extraction and gas phase stripping methods are generally inefficient procedures for isolating polar, acidic, or basic compounds in an aqueous matrix due to the low efficiency of water immiscible solvents for the extraction of these compounds and their low volatility and high water affinity which results in a very slow transfer to the gas phase using... 

Some enzymes have been found to be capable of conversion of the polyaromatic sulfur heterocycles in mixtures of an aqueous phase containing buffer+water-miscible solvent and a water-immiscible solvent. For example, conversion of thiophenes and sulfides was demonstrated in an aqueous system with 20% acetonitrile in contact with 0.2% diesel. A process for sulfur removal was designed based on this reaction [394], Additional details were given in Section 4.2.1. In a subsequent study effect of this system on PAH... 

L. Brown, P. J. Hailing, G. A. Johnston, and C. J. Suckling, Water insoluble indicators for the measurement of pH in water immiscible solvents, Tetrahedron Lett. 31, 5799-5802 (1990). 

Last but not least, catechols are highly water-soluble (the water solubility of catechol is approximately 1 g per 2.3 mL of water), which makes it difficult to directly extract them in situ from reaction media with organic, water immiscible solvents. Nevertheless, extraction of catechols from aqueous systems with hydro-phobic polymers such as the polystyrene-based resin Amberlite XAD-4 is... 

Enzyme catalysis in nonconventional media can be divided into a number of different categories depending on whether the aqueous and organic phases are miscible or immiscible and whether the biocatalyst is dissolved or not. In this section, only free enzymes will be considered. Thus, the field can be simplified to just two categories, depending on whether the solvent is water miscible or immiscible (systems employing water-immiscible solvents, where water is present in quantities that are below its solubility limit, have been considered as monophasic) ... 

A major cause of suboptimal activity in organic solvent results from the removal of essential water during enzyme dehydration. All enzymes require some water in order to retain activity through the provision of conformational flexibihty. Particularly in the case of lipases, the amount of water can be so low that it appears that none is required. For example, following the development of suitable techniques to analyse low water concentrations, it has been reported that the lipase from Rhizomucor miehei retains 30 % of its optimum activity with as little as two or three water molecules per molecule of enzyme.Owing to the apparent absence of water in some exceptional cases, the term biocatalysis in anhydrous solvent is commonly used, although in the vast majority of cases a monolayer of water is required for optimal activity (although this is often stUl well below its solubility limit in water-immiscible solvent). ... 

The next step is to determine the solubility of the substrate (or its salts) in different solvents. This can also be performed by an automated liquid handling system. Depending upon the solubility of the substrate in water-miscible solvent (alcohols, acetone, tetrahydrofuran, etc.) and water-immiscible solvents (ethyl acetate, methyl-tert-butyl ether, heptane, etc.) the process chemist can identify one or many solvent systems from which the substrate (or its salts) could be ciystallized using the antisolvent addition strategy. 

Table 2.1 Selected Properties of Some Water-Immiscible Solvents... 

Often the enzyme stability can be improved by using a suitable water-immiscible solvent instead of a water-miscible one. Two-phase systems are obtained with the enzyme and other hydrophilic substances present in the aqueous phase while hydrophobic substrates and products mainly partition to the organic phase (Figure 9.1). Water immiscible solvents often used for enzymatic reactions are hydrocarbons, ethers and esters further details on solvents are found in the section 9.5 Selection of solvents , below. In order for the bioconversion to occur, the substrates must be transferred to the enzyme in the aqueous phase after the reaction hydrophobic... 

An excellent review of composite RO and nanofiltration (NF) membranes is available (8). These thin-film, composite membranes consist of a thin polymer barrier layer formed on one or more porous support layers, which is almost always a different polymer from the surface layer. The surface layer determines the flux and separation characteristics of the membrane. The porous backing serves only as a support for the barrier layer and so has almost no effect on membrane transport properties. The barrier layer is extremely thin, thus allowing high water fluxes. The most important thin-film composite membranes are made by interfacial polymerization, a process in which a highly porous membrane, usually polysulfone, is coated with an aqueous solution of a polymer or monomer and then reacts with a cross-linking agent in a water-immiscible solvent. 

Other patents illustrate the use of a solvent extraction process to separate the alcohol products from the catalyst (130, 131). When a catalyst solution containing alcohol products is mixed with water and a water-immiscible solvent, the alcohol products are extracted into the aqueous phase and the rhodium species enter the water-immiscible solvent. The effectiveness of the extraction and the stability of the rhodium catalyst can be greatly increased by carrying out the process under CO pressure (131). 

The solubility of water in a water-immiscible solvent at water activity 1 can be determined by equilibrating the solvent with pure water, followed by water analysis, for example, by Karl Fischer titration. At water activities lower than 1, lower amounts of water dissolve in the solvents, as shown in Figure 1.3. It should be noted that the solubility of water in the solvent changes when solvent composition is changed, for example, by dissolving substrates (Figure 1.3). In a hydrophobic solvent the increase in solubility of water can be substantial when substrates are dissolved in it. 

Organic solvent systems include mixtures of water and water-miscible solvents, biphasic systems of water and water-immiscible solvents, pure organic solvents, and reverse micellar systems. 

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