Enzymatic synthesis of sugar esters in ionic liquids

Sugar esters are nonionic surfactants. Because of their amphiphilic nature, they are widely used in pharmaceutical, food and cosmetic industries. In addition, sugar esters also show antitumor and/or antibiotic activities. Sugar esters could be prepared enzymatically under mild conditions with a high specificity. Synthesis of sugar esters in organic solvents is difficult due to the low solubility of sugars. As a new kind of green solvents, ionic liquids have many advantages over organic solvents for enzymatic synthesis of sugar esters. The advances achieved in this area in recent years are reviewed in this paper.