REACTION OF GLYOXAL WITH ALIPHATIC-ALCOHOLS USING CATIONIC EXCHANGE RESINS AS CATALYSTS

The applicability of cationic exchange resins, such as Indion 130, Amb erlyst-15, and Amberlite IR-120, as catalysts was evaluated for the re actions of glyoxal with different aliphatic alcohols to give mono-and diacetals, The alcohols studied in the present work were methanal, n-b utanol, isoamyl alcohol, and 2-ethylhexanol. In all cases, the presenc e of water in the reaction mixture was found to have a strong impact a n the equilibrium conversion and the reaction kinetics, The removal. o f water results in a significant enhancement in the conversion levels, Reaction parameters such as mole ratio of reactants, temperature, and catalyst loading were studied to maximize the selectivity towards the industrially more important product, Le., monoacetals of glyoxal, Exp erimental data for the batch reactions of methanol are very well expla ined by a simple pseudohomogeneous model, A simplified lumped paramete r model, consisting of four parameters, based on the Langmuir-Hinshelw ood-Hougen-Watson mechanism, has been proposed for the reactions of gl yoxal with less reactive alcohols (n-butanol, isoamyl alcohol, and 2-e thylhexanol), as the effect of water concentration on the kinetics of these reactions cannot be explained by a pseudohomogeneous model.