Flow Chemistry and Mixing

I studied the alkylation of substituted benzoic acids by iodomethane in the presence of a proton sponge (TMGN). The Hammett reaction constant was obtained for this reaction, and the activation parameters were obtained by studying the reaction kinetics at different temperatures. Using this setup and using bi-functional substrates, the reaction selectivity in the microsystem was also investigated. Using this microreactor, the kinetics of N-alkylation of several organic superbases by iodomethane was also studied. Finally, the microreactor system enabled the small-scale synthesis of several natural compounds. The alkylation of quercetin, Trolox (an antioxidant), clofibric acid, and podocarpic acid (an antitumor medicine) by iodomethane in the presence of TMGN was conducted at the scale of millimole.  My Erasmus student (Thijs Janssens) also studied the selectivity of the syringic acid reaction. Two papers (1 and 2) were extracted from this work, and I presented my findings in five national/international conferences.