Synthesis of highly crystalline LaFeO nanospheres for phenoxazinone synthase mimicking activity

• Published in: RSC advances 2021-05, Vol.11 (29), p.17746-17754
• Main Authors: Khairy, Mohamed, Mahmoud, Abdelrahman H, Khalil, Kamal M. S
• Format: Article
• ISSN: 2046-2069
• DOI: 10.1039/d1ra02295d

LaFeO 3 nanospheres with an orthorhombic perovskite structure were synthesized by a sol-gel autocombustion method in the presence of different citric acid ratios ( x = 2, 4, 8, and 16) and utilized for the photocatalytic conversion of o -aminophenol (OAP) to 2-aminophenoxazine-3-one (APX) for the first time. OAP is one of the most toxic phenolic derivatives used as a starting material in many industries; however, the dimerization product APX has diverse therapeutic properties. Photocatalytic conversion was carried out in ethanol/water and acetonitrile/water mixtures in the absence and presence of molecular oxygen at ambient temperature via the oxidative coupling reaction that mimics phenoxazinone synthase-like activity. The LaFeO 3 samples showed a superior photocatalytic activity of OAP to APX with rate constants of 0.43 and 0.92 min −1 in the absence and presence of molecular oxygen, respectively. Thus, the LaFeO 3 nanozymes could be used as promising candidates in industrial water treatment and phenoxazinone synthase-like activity. LaFeO 3 nanospheres were synthesized by a facile sol-gel autocombustion method and explored for the photocatalytic transformation of o -aminophenol to 2-aminophenoxazine-3-one.