Plant‐based Basic Carbocatalyst for Lactone Ring‐Opening Polymerization and Isosorbide Transesterification with High Efficiency

Basic carbocatalyst made of simple natural precursors using environmentally friendly processes are eagerly required for a wide range of chemical processes. This work is devoted to a carbocatalyst with base functionality from soybean flour as a nitrogen-rich carbon source. This metal-free basic carbocatalyst showed a density of basic sites of 0.165 mmol g−1 as quantified via CO2-TPD. The activity of the prepared basic carbons was successfully confirmed in two industrially important base-catalyzed reactions of green chemistry, namely, ring-opening polymerization (ROP) of ϵ-caprolactone and transesterification of isosorbide with dimethyl carbonate. Utilizing the prepared basic carbon in the ROP reaction of ϵ-caprolactone, gave a white polymer with high molecular weight (Mw=30000 g mol−1), which is comparable to industrial products. Moreover, a yield of 79 % of isosorbide bismethyl carbonate was obtained using the prepared basic carbon in isosorbide transesterification with dimethyl carbonate at 493 K for 6 hours.