Effective Production of Enantiomers: Positive Résumé of the EU Project INTENANT
Enantiomers are molecules behaving like the right hand to the left hand. Although their physical properties in general are identical, their biological effects may vary dramatically and many of them play an important role in pharmaceutical, agrochemical and cosmetics industries. Today different concepts compete for the production of enantiomers. Either only one enantiomer is produced (only “right hands”) or from a mixture of enantiomers, the desired one is isolated via chromatography or crystallization. Usually both concepts are used independently. The aim of the EU funded project “INTegrated synthesis and purification of single ENANTiomers” was to combine known methods for improving efficiency and effectiveness in the production of simple high purity enantiomers. New, shortened, cost efficient and easily applicable methods for the industrial production of pure enantiomers could be developed, improving the competitiveness of European economy. Project coordinator Prof. Andreas Seidel-Morgenstern is pleased about the positive evaluation of the project and summarises the results: “We discovered new methods for efficient combinations of processes to synthesize and separate enantiomerically pure substances. Today it will become easier to choose the lowest cost method for the production of active enantiomeric components. Together with a team of committed scientists, engineers and industrialists, the development of systematic approaches to the selection of model-based processes was the key to success.” INTENANT was funded via the 7th framework programme of EU with an amount of 3.6 Mio Euro; the project partners had to contribute some of their own financial support. For three years Professor Andreas Seidel-Morgenstern from Max Planck Institute in Magdeburg (Germany) has been coordinating a project consortium of 13 industrial and academic partners from 6 European countries. The experts worked in synthesis and processing and the results were collected in Magdeburg. The Max Planck Institute was responsible for application and submission of the proposal as well as coordination and evaluation of the project. Further, it acted as contact partner for the European Commission, too. Find more information on the INTENANT project at www.intenant.eu
Countries
Germany, France, Italy, Sweden, United Kingdom