Fw. Lichtenthaler et S. Mondel, PERSPECTIVES IN THE USE OF LOW-MOLECULAR-WEIGHT CARBOHYDRATES AS ORGANIC RAW-MATERIALS, Pure and applied chemistry, 69(9), 1997, pp. 1853-1866
Carbohydrates represent 95% of the annually renewable biomass, yet the
ir vast potential as organic raw materials for chemical industry is mo
stly unexploited. The challenge posed by the necessity to increasingly
replace fossile raw materials by those annually regrowing is obvious:
systematic basic and applied research for opening up new, non-food ap
plication fields for carbohydrates in general and for mono-and disacch
arides in particular, as these are more suited for straightforward che
mical transformations. - This account gives an overview on recent effo
rts towards the conversion of inexpensive, bulk-scale accessible mono-
and disaccharides - most notably glucose, fructose, sucrose, and isoma
ltulose - into products with potential industrial application profiles
. Thereby, the practicality of the conversion methodologies is emphasi
zed such as the use of simple reactions, of inexpensive reagents, and,
if not avoidable altogether, of simple protecting groups in the ''rea
ction channels'' leading from sugars to industrially relevant products
, in addition to aiming for stable, readily purificable compounds and
useful overall yields. Also discussed are the perspectives towards the
desired substitution of petrochemicals by those derived from carbohyd
rates, by ''glycochemicals'', so to say. Prospects are bright, yet, in
their outcome, strongly depend on the actions taken - by academic gro
ups, by funding institutions, and, most importantly, by chemical indus
try - for the further systematic, broad scale exploitation of high and
low molecular carbohydrates towards products with industrially viable
property profiles.