Understanding Methyl Salicylate Hydrolysis in the Presence of Amino Acids

Methyl salicylate, the major flavor component in wintergreen oil, is commonly used as food additives. It was found that amino acids can unexpectedly expedite methyl salicylate hydrolysis in an alkaline environment, while the detailed mechanism of this reaction merits investigation. Herein, the role of amino acid, more specifically, glycine, in methyl salicylate hydrolysis in aqueous solution was explored. ¹H NMR spectroscopy, combined with density functional theory calculations, was employed to investigate the methyl salicylate hydrolysis in the presence and absence of glycine at pH 9. The addition of glycine was found to accelerate the hydrolysis by an order of magnitude at pH 9, compared to that at pH 7. The end hydrolyzed product was confirmed to be salicylic acid, suggesting that glycine does not directly form an amide bond with methyl salicylate via aminolysis. Importantly, our results indicate that the ortho-hydroxyl substituent in methyl salicylate is essential for its hydrolysis due to an intramolecular hydrogen bond, and the carboxyl group of glycine is crucial to methyl salicylate hydrolysis. This study gains a new understanding of methyl salicylate hydrolysis that will be helpful in finding ways of stabilizing wintergreen oil as a flavorant in consumer food products that also contain amino acids.