Rhodium catalyzed hydroformylation of 1-decene in low melting mixtures based on various cyclodextrins and N,N′-dimethylurea

•Low melting mixtures were prepared by mixing cyclodextrin and N,N′-dimethylurea.•These low melting mixtures can be used as solvents for hydroformylation reaction.•Catalytic activities depend on viscosity and 1-decene solubility.•The catalytic system can be recycled without loss of catalytic activity.

Different low melting mixtures (LMMs) based on N,N′-dimethylurea (DMU) and various cyclodextrin (CD) derivatives were synthetized. The melting point was weakly affected by the size and the chemical modification of CD. By contrast, the chemical modification of CD led to a decrease in viscosity of the LMMs. These mixtures were evaluated as solvent in rhodium-catalyzed hydroformylation reaction of 1-decene. The LMM based on DMU/RAME-β-CD (70/30) allowed reaching the highest catalytic activity (1980 h− 1). The influence of several factors was studied and it was established that the conversion increased with the 1-decene solubility and decreased with the LMM viscosity.

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