A New Synthesis Of Progesterone And Its Key Intermediates From Phytosterol

Progesterone is one of the most important hormones of the steroidal pregnane series and plays important roles for the maintenance of pregnancy. And it has many biological activity include tocolysis 、promoting breast development、inhibition of ovulation and so on, widely used in the pharmaceutical industry. It will have broad application prospect and huge quantity demand.The separation and purification of stigmasterol from phytosterol by circulation crystallization method was based on the difference of the solubility of stigmasterol in n-heptane and dichloroethane. The recovery of mother liquid by fraction crystallization method was based on the difference of the selectivity of the different content stigmasterol, using methanol, dichloroethane, n-heptane and water as solvent.The experimental results showed that the content of stigmasterol was 97.1% after six successive crystallization and the yield of stigmasterol was 73.9% after four times circulation crystallization operation in dichloroethane and n-heptane.Progesterone was synthesized within four steps by employing stigmasterol as starting material, which was separated from phytosterol. Firstly, a intermediate of progesterone, 3-ketobisnor-4-cholenaldehyde was synthesized through oppenauer oxidation, ozonation. Secondly, compound was further converted progesterone through addition-condensation and cuprous chloride catalysed oxygenation, the overall yield is 69.1%.Herein a new synthetic process for progesterone had been elaborated, compared with the traditional process, the material for this process is utilization of deodorizer distillate oil, it’s more extensive and resourceful sources; what’s more, using air as oxidant replaced chromium reagents, less environmental pollution, and will be more suitable for industrialized-scale preparation.