Facile Synthesis of CuO–Ni/Al Composites for Catalytic Oxidation of Cyclohexene

• Published in: Catalysis letters 2019-05, Vol.149 (5), p.1337-1344
• Main Authors: Ma, Ang, Cheng, YangYang, Bai, Yijia, Hao, Jianmin, Chu, Fumin, Han, Limin, Zhou, Huacong
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Alkenes; Aluminum; Catalysis; Catalysts; Catalytic activity; Catalytic oxidation; Chemistry; Chemistry and Materials Science; Composite materials; Copper oxides; Cyclohexene; Electroless deposition; Electroless plating; Electron microscopy; Inductively coupled plasma; Industrial Chemistry/Chemical Engineering; Microscopy; Nickel; Optical emission spectroscopy; Organometallic Chemistry; Oxidation; Oxidation-reduction reactions; Oxygen; Photoelectrons; Physical Chemistry; Selectivity; Spectroscopy; X ray powder diffraction; X-ray diffraction; X-ray spectroscopy
• ISSN: 1011-372X; 1572-879X
• DOI: 10.1007/s10562-019-02719-5

CuO–Ni/Al composites were synthesized by electroless deposition and thermal oxidation and characterized by inductively coupled plasma optical emission spectrometry, X-ray powder diffraction, scanning electron microscopy and X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy. Their performances as the heterogeneous catalysts for the solvent-free allylic oxidation of cyclohexene by oxygen were determined. It was found that the CuO contents and the amount of adsorbed oxygen species on the composites could significantly affect their catalytic performances in cyclohexene oxidation. The highest catalytic activity was achieved over CuO–Ni/Al-3 containing 18.5 wt% CuO with the highest amount of adsorbed oxygen species, which resulted in the maximum cyclohexene conversion of 39.1% and the total selectivity of 85.5% to 2-cyclohexene-1-ol, 2-cyclohexene-1-one, 2-cyclohexene-1-hydroperoxide and cyclohexene oxide. In addition, the catalyst was successfully recycled with no significant catalytic activity loss after three cycles. Graphical Abstract