Dihydroxyfumaric Acid

This chapter presents a review of the research that was conducted on a natural antioxidant - dihydroxyfumaric acid in the frames of the laboratory of physical and quantum chemistry. The structure and chemistry of dihydroxyfumaric acid are presented in view of its importance in biological cycles, as well as in prebiotic chemistry models. Technological applications are briefly reviewed for wine, food, and tobacco industries. Organic syntheses of new derivatives are presented, and their calculated antioxidant/antiradical activities towards the DPPH and ABTS radicals are discussed. Computational chemistry techniques are employed to gain insights into the isomerism and tautomerism of dihydroxyfumaric acid, and indices of global and local reactivity are calculated for the acid and its new derivatives, in order to theoretically explain the experimental results.