Synthesis of 2-ethylhexyl oleate catalyzed by Candida antarctica lipase immobilized on a magnetic polymer support in continuous flow

This study investigated the synthesis of 2-ethylhexyl oleate catalyzed by Candida antarctica lipase immobilized on magnetic poly(styrene- co -divinylbenzene) particles in a continuous packed-bed bioreactor. Runs were carried out in a solvent-free system at 50 °C. The performance of the reactor was evaluated for substrates composed by oleic acid and 2-ethylhexanol at five molar ratios (1:4–4:1), determining its operation limits in terms of substrate flow rate. The system performance was quantified for three different flow rates corresponding to space-time between 3 and 12 h. For each condition, the influence of the space-time in the ester formation, esterification yield and productivity was determined. The molar ratio of acid-to-alcohol interfered, in a remarkable way, in the formation of 2-ethylhexyl oleate and the best performance was attained for substrate at equimolar ratio running at 12 h space-time. Under this condition, average 2-ethylhexyl oleate concentration was 471.65 ± 2.98 g L −1 which corresponded to ester productivity of 23.16 ± 0.49 mmol g −1 L −1 h −1 . This strategy also gave high biocatalyst operational stability, revealing a half-life time of 2063 h. A model based on the ping-pong Bi–Bi mechanism was developed to describe the kinetics of the esterification reaction and validated using experimental data. The goodness of fit of the model was satisfactory ( R 2 = 0.9310–0.9952).