Synthesis of Curcumin
A century after its isolation from turmeric, the first paper on synthesis of curcumin was reported by
Lampe in 1918 [28]. The method involved five steps starting from carbomethoxyferuloyl chloride and
ethyl acetoacetate. Later Pabon [29] reported a simple method for the synthesis of curcumin in high
yields using acetyl acetone and substituted aromatic aldehydes in the presence of boron trioxide (B2O3),
trialkyl borate and n-butylamine and with slight modifications this method by Pabon [29] has been
adopted by several research groups for practically all subsequent curcumin syntheses [3,4,30–32]. There
are some patents indicating utilization of B2O3, trialkylborate and n-butylamine along with inert organic
amide solvents to improve the yields. Attempts to replace boric oxide with boric acid did not prove to be