Impact of Fatty Acid Structure on CALB‐Catalyzed Esterification of Glucose

Enzymatic synthesis of fatty acid glucose esters from different fatty acyl donors are performed via enzymatic catalysis in the presence of Candida antarctica lipase B (CALB), using acetonitrile as the solvent. The acyl donor nature (fatty acid or fatty acid vinyl ester) and structure are varied. Lower reaction rates and lower conversions are obtained with fatty acids in comparison to their corresponding vinyl esters. Moreover, the acyl donor with the longest chain length gives the highest conversions. The presence of unsaturation on the acyl donor chain is also shown to be detrimental to the conversion. Practical Applications: The practical applications of the present work are related to the production of gluco‐esters that could be used as nonionic surfactants as detergents, cosmetics and food emulsifiers, emollients or conservatives, respectively. In this study, it is shown that in order to get high production yields, each reaction parameter has to be tuned properly.