Carbon dioxide chemistry for synthesis

二氧化碳(CO2)是一种容易获得的、极其便宜的有机合成试剂，主要是因为它是一种废物。与传统形式的生物质原料(淀粉、蔗糖、纤维素、油)相比，发电厂产生的副产品二氧化碳的规模要大得多。二氧化碳极低的价格、极高的利用率和低毒是寻求二氧化碳新用途的强大动机因素。开发废旧二氧化碳的多种用途是我研究的长期目标。当用作试剂时，二氧化碳通常会取代光气或一氧化碳，这两种气体都更昂贵，毒性也很大。目前，只有少数几种产品(甲醇、聚碳酸酯、碳酸亚丙酯、尿素和水杨酸)可以将二氧化碳转化为增值产品。从二氧化碳合成其他一些产品已经证明，但还没有工业化，毫无疑问，还有许多其他产品是可能的。我建议研究几种使用二氧化碳的新合成方法，并将重点放在阻止进一步采用二氧化碳固定的具体问题上。

Carbon dioxide (CO2) is a readily available, extremely inexpensive reagent for organic synthesis primarily because it is a waste material. CO2 produced as a byproduct from power plants is available on a far larger scale than traditional forms of biomass feedstocks (starch, sucrose, cellulose, oils). The very low price, very high availability, and low toxicity of CO2 are strong motivating factors for pursuing new uses of CO2. It is the long-term goal of my research to develop many applications of waste CO2. When used as a reagent, CO2 typically replaces phosgene or carbon monoxide, both of which are more expensive and very toxic. The conversion of CO2 to value-added products is currently practiced for only a few products (methanol, polycarbonates, propylene carbonate, urea, and salicylic acid). Syntheses of some other products from CO2 have been demonstrated but not yet industrialized, and many others are no doubt possible. I propose to investigate several new syntheses using CO2 and to focus on specific problems that are preventing further adoption of CO2 fixation.