Palladium‐Catalyzed Hydroxycarbonylation of Diisobutene: Systematic Optimization by Central Composite Design

Abstract The selection of suitable catalysts and reaction conditions are key elements for efficient process development. In this work, stability studies of homogeneous palladium catalysts used for the hydroxycarbonylation of olefins to aliphatic carboxylic acids are presented. Based on this, the hydroxycarbonylation of diisobutene, which represents an industrially relevant mixture of olefins, was investigated and optimized by means of central composite design with respect to the yield of the target product 3,5,5‐trimethylhexanoic acid. The modeling succeeds with high accuracy and allows to gain information about interactions between different factors in the reaction system. This allows a more accurate prediction of the reaction behavior and permits easier future scale‐up of such processes.