MECHANOCHEMICAL ACTIVATION OF NAHCO3: A CO2 SOLID SURROGATE IN CARBOXYLATION REACTIONS

Carbon dioxide, a primary driver of global warming, offers a promising feedstock for valuable chemical synthesis. Nonetheless, the reliance on highly pressurized canisters and specialized equipment limits its practical application in fine chemical synthesis. This study explores the innovative use of sodium bicarbonate (NaHCO3) as a safe, solid on-demand source of CO2 under mechanochemical conditions to perform carboxylation reactions. In one example, we report the mechanochemical synthesis of cyclic carbamate, enabling more practical and sustainable conditions for the synthesis of these compounds respect to solution-based precedents. In a second application, we disclose the synthesis of organic carbonates from bicarbonate, which has no precedents in solution. We further showcase the potential of our approach in the pharmaceutical industry by demonstrating the solvent-minimized synthesis of pharmaceutically relevant molecules and introducing a novel 13C-labeling strategy utilizing NaH13CO3.