Citric acid as an efficient and green catalyst for the synthesis of hexabenzylhexaazaisowurtzitane (HBIW)

Authors

• Sahar Shokrollahi ¹
• Ali Ramazani ^{2, 3}
• Seyed Jamal Tabatabaei Rezaei ¹
• Asemeh Mashhadi Malekzadeh ¹
• Pegah Azimzadeh Asiabi ¹
• Sang Woo Joo ⁴

1. Department of Chemistry, University of Zanjan, P O Box 45195-313, Zanjan, Iran
2. Department of Biotechnology, Research Institute of Modern Biological Techniques (RIMBT), University of Zanjan, Zanjan 45371-38791, Iran
3. Department of Chemistry, Faculty of Science, University of Zanjan, 45371-38791 Zanjan, Iran
4. School of Mechanical Engineering, Yeungnam University, Gyeongsan 712-749, Republic of Korea.

Abstract

The condensation of benzylamine with glyoxal leads to Hexabenzylhexaazaisowurtzitane (HBIW) in acetonitrile solvent with citric acid as a green catalyst under both conventional stirring and ultrasonic irradiation conditions. The influence of four variables, including the amount of catalyst, solvent, reaction time and ultrasonic power, on the reaction yield was investigated. The results showed that the optimum parameters for synthesis of HBIW were 5% mol with respect to glyoxal for catalyst, acetonitrile-water as solvent, 5 minutes as reaction time and 150 W for ultrasonic power. In general, improvement in rates and yields were observed when the reactions were carried out under sonication in comparison with classic conditions.

Keywords

• Citric acid
• Green chemistry
• ultrasound irradiation
• Hexabenzylhexaazaisowurtzitane (HBIW)