Generalized Rapid Synthesis of Supported Nanocluster Catalyst for Mild Hydrogenation of Phenol toward KA Oil

Hehe Wei; Shengxian Shao; Bohan Deng; Yufeng Xue; Wenxing Chen; Linlin Yin; Yunxiang Lin; Naveed Hussain; Xiaodong Wu; Binghui Ge; Fengbin Zheng; Guodong Li; Li-Min Liu; Hui Wu

doi:10.1002/smll.202207759

Generalized Rapid Synthesis of Supported Nanocluster Catalyst for Mild Hydrogenation of Phenol toward KA Oil

Small. 2023 Sep;19(36):e2207759. doi: 10.1002/smll.202207759. Epub 2023 May 7.

Authors

Hehe Wei^{1

2}, Shengxian Shao^{3

4}, Bohan Deng¹, Yufeng Xue⁵, Wenxing Chen⁶, Linlin Yin³, Yunxiang Lin⁷, Naveed Hussain¹, Xiaodong Wu¹, Binghui Ge⁷, Fengbin Zheng³, Guodong Li^{3

4}, Li-Min Liu⁵, Hui Wu¹

Affiliations

¹ State Key Laboratory of New Ceramics and Fine Processing, School of Materials Science and Engineering, Tsinghua University, Beijing, 100084, China.
² State Key Laboratory of Green Chemical Engineering and Industrial Catalysis, Key Laboratory for Advanced Materials, Center for Computational Chemistry and Research Institute of Industrial Catalysis, School of Chemistry and Molecular Engineering, East China University of Science and Technology, Shanghai, 200237, China.
³ Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) Key Laboratory of Nanosystem and Hierarchical Fabrication, CAS Center for Excellence in Nanoscience, National Center for Nanoscience and Technology, Beijing, 100190, China.
⁴ School of Nanoscience and Technology, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, 100049, China.
⁵ School of Physics, Beihang University, Beijing, 100191, China.
⁶ Beijing Key Laboratory of Construction Tailorable Advanced Functional Materials and Green Applications, School of Materials Science and Engineering, Beijing Institute of Technology, Beijing, 100081, China.
⁷ Institutes of Physical Science and Information Technology, Anhui University, Hefei, 230601, China.

PMID: 37150859
DOI: 10.1002/smll.202207759

Abstract

Homogeneous and nanometric metal clusters with unique electronic structures are promising for catalysis, however, common synthesis techniques for metal clusters suffer from large size and even metal nanocrystals attributing to their high surface energy and unsaturated configurations. Herein, a generalized rapid annealing strategy for synthesizing a series of supported metal clusters as superior catalysts is developed. Remarkably, TiO₂ supported platinum nanoclusters (Pt NC/TiO₂ ) exhibits the excellent catalytic activity to realize phenol hydrogenation under mild conditions. The complete phenol conversion rate and 100% selectivity toward KA oil are achieved in aqueous solution at room temperature and normal pressure. Semi-continuous scale up production of KA oil is successfully performed under mild conditions. Such excellent performance mainly originates from the partial reconstruction of Pt NC/TiO₂ in aqueous phenol solution. Considering that the phenol can be produced from lignin, this study underpins a facile, sustainable, and economical route to synthesize nylon from biomass.

Keywords: direct and rapid solution annealing; metal clusters; phenol hydrogenation; reconstruction; room temperature.

Abstract

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