Optimised Pd removal from a pharmaceutical intermediate with 60% reduction in scavenger usage

A pharmaceutical client produced an intermediate using palladium catalysis which resulted in 1500 ppm Pd in the isolated product. Treatment of the product with the PhosphonicS product SEM26 removed the palladium to < 20 ppm using more than 100 wt% scavenger in batch slurry treatment. A PhASE program was carried out to optimise the scavenging process:

Screening of the PhosphonicS scavenger library identified SPM32 and SEM26 as the optimal scavengers.
Optimisation showed that increasing the treatment temperature from 40 to 60 °C resulted in a 60% reduction in treatment time with no compromise in product quality. The optimisation also showed that treatment in flow could reduce the scavenger by 60 – 90%. A column trial with a 1.5 h residence time reduced the Pd to less than 1 ppm in solution.

In conclusion, the requirement of < 10 ppm Pd in the final product was met with reduced treatment time and reduced scavenger usage