Silica-supported sulfonic acids as recyclable catalyst for esterification of levulinic acid with stoichiometric amounts of alcohols

• Raimondo Maggi,
• N. Raveendran Shiju,
• Veronica Santacroce,
• Giovanni Maestri,
• Franca Bigi and
• Gadi Rothenberg

Beilstein J. Org. Chem. 2016, 12, 2173–2180, doi:10.3762/bjoc.12.207

• : esterification; heterogeneous catalysis; renewable feedstocks; supported organic catalysts; sustainable chemistry; Introduction Vegetal biomass is mankind’s only source of renewable carbon on a human timescale. It is abundantly available, with the potential of replacing fossil-based carbon on a scale sufficient