Issue 3, 2015

Mesoporous inorganic salts with crystal defects: unusual catalysts and catalyst supports

Abstract

We proposed a strategy to synthesize mesoporous inorganic salt particles using the special properties of ionic liquid (IL) mixtures, and hollow mesoporous LaF3, NdF3, and YF3 particles were synthesized and characterized using different techniques. The size of the mesopores in the salt particles was about 4 nm, and the materials were full of crystal defects. The LaF3, NdF3 and YF3 particles were used as the catalysts for the cyanosilylation reaction of benzaldehyde using trimethylsilyl cyanide, and Ru/LaF3 and Ru/NdF3, in which Ru nanocatalysts were supported on the LaF3 and NdF3 particles with mesopores, were used to catalyze hydrogenations of benzene to cyclohexane and levulinic acid (LA) to γ-valerolactone (GVL). It was discovered that the activities of these catalysts were unprecedentedly high for these reactions. Detailed study showed that both the crystal defects and the mesopores in the salt particles played crucial roles for the extremely high catalytic activity.

Graphical abstract: Mesoporous inorganic salts with crystal defects: unusual catalysts and catalyst supports

Supplementary files

Article information

Article type
Edge Article
Submitted
03 Dec 2014
Accepted
06 Jan 2015
First published
06 Jan 2015
This article is Open Access

All publication charges for this article have been paid for by the Royal Society of Chemistry
Creative Commons BY license

Chem. Sci., 2015,6, 1668-1675

Mesoporous inorganic salts with crystal defects: unusual catalysts and catalyst supports

X. Kang, W. Shang, Q. Zhu, J. Zhang, T. Jiang, B. Han, Z. Wu, Z. Li and X. Xing, Chem. Sci., 2015, 6, 1668 DOI: 10.1039/C4SC03736G

This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported Licence. You can use material from this article in other publications without requesting further permissions from the RSC, provided that the correct acknowledgement is given.

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