Kinetic investigation of aerobic epoxidation of limonene over cobalt substituted mesoporous SBA-16

Abstract

Incorporation of low coordination Co²⁺ within the structure of mesoporous silica SBA-16 has been accomplished through a facile and green “pH adjusting” method. The resulting materials were used as heterogeneous catalysts for aerobic Mukaiyama epoxidation of limonene in the presence of isobutyraldehyde, under very mild conditions. The structural integrity during the pH adjustment procedure at various loadings and states of cobalt ions within the mesoporous structure were determined using characterization techniques including nitrogen physisorption, X-ray fluorescence, diffuse reflectance UV-vis, scanning electron microscopy, temperature-programmed reduction, X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy and powder X-ray diffraction. These catalysts showed quite high reactivity for the epoxidation of limonene with high epoxide yields under optimized oxygen pressure. In this work, a thorough kinetic analysis of aerobic epoxidation of limonene was investigated to allow proposing a reaction scheme. A new mechanism, in which a surface reaction between a Co³⁺OO⁻ peroxo intermediate and limonene was found to be involved in the formation of the epoxidized limonene. The kinetics developed from the proposed mechanism was accurately fitted with extensive experimental initial reaction rate data. The activation energy for limonene mono epoxide formation was determined to be 22 kJ mol⁻¹.