Effect of porous structure on the formation of active sites in manganese hosted in ordered mesoporous silica catalysts for environmental protection

Recently ordered mesoporous silicas have been considered as suitable catalyst supports due to their high surface area, well developed porous volume and tuned size, shape and topology of mesopores. Among them SBA-15 and KIT-6 are most promising and studied materials as host matrix of metal/metal oxide nanoparticles. Both structures are characterized with cylindrical mesopores which are 2D- and 3D-packed in the SBA-15 and KIT-6 silicas, respectively. The flexibility of the oxidation state of manganese ensures high oxygen storage capacity of its oxides and provokes their wide application as catalysts in various redox processes. The aim of the current investigation is to clear the effect of pore topology in SBA-15 and KIT-6 mesoporous silicas on the state of the hosted in them manganese oxide nanoparticles. The samples were obtained by incipient wetness impregnation of silicas with manganese nitrate and conventional SiO₂ was also used as a reference support. A complex of physicochemical techniques, such as nitrogen physisorption, X-ray diffraction, UV–Vis, XPS, FTIR and temperature-programmed reduction with hydrogen was used for samples characterization. The obtained modifications were tested as potential catalysts for environmental protection via total oxidation of VOCs (ethyl acetate) or hydrogen production from methanol as clean and effective alternative fuel. It was established that the porous structure of mesoporous silica supports influences in a complex way the catalytic behaviour of their manganese modifications, which is determined by the specificity of the reaction medium.     

High quality mesoporous materials prepared by supercritical fluid extraction: effect of curing treatment on their structural stability

Mesoporous molecular sieves like SBA-1, SBA-3, MCM-41 and MCM-48 are generally synthesized by using a quaternary ammonium surfactant as a structure-directing agent to form a porous silica framework. The used templating agent is conventionally removed for producing mesopores by calcination at high temperature. In this study, supercritical fluid extraction (SFE) has been employed to remove organic templates from these materials. We found that more than 80% of the templating agent can be successfully removed by using this technique. Among these materials, SBA-3 was observed to experience the collapse of mesoporous structures upon the SFE process. Thus, we have proposed pre-SFE thermal aging as a curing treatment method and found that it has significantly improved the mesoporous structural stability of SBA-3. In the meantime, this curing method has lead to these SFE-processed materials with better ordered mesoporous structures, such as SBA-3 having specific surface area as large as 1670 m²/g.     

Synthesis of nanocast ordered mesoporous carbons and their application as electrode materials for supercapacitor

Various nanocast ordered mesoporous carbons (OMCs) were synthesized using mesoporous silicas such as SBA-15, SBA-16, KIT-6, SBA-3 and MCM-48 as templates via nanocasting pathway. The structures of OMCs were analyzed by X-ray diffraction, transmission electron microscope and nitrogen sorption technique. These OMCs with well-defined pore structure were used as model electrode materials for investigating the influence of pore structure on their double layer capacitances. The cyclic voltammetry and galvanostatic charge/discharge measurements were conducted to estimate the capacitive behaviour of OMCs. The results show that the mesopore structures of OMCs play an important role in improving surface utilization for the formation of electrical double layer. OMCs synthesized from SBA-15 and SBA-16 show great advantage over others because their micropores are being easy accessible through the mesopores, thus allowing rapid electrolyte ion diffusion. To achieve a higher specific capacitance (μF cm⁻²), the optimized amount ratio between micropore and mesopore needs to be controlled. In addition, great impact of the electrode disc thickness on the capacitive performance was demonstrated by a series of careful measurements.     

有序介孔氮化碳的制备及其催化Knoevenagel缩合反应

以四氯化碳和乙二胺为前驱体,介孔氧化硅SBA-15为硬模板剂,采用纳米浇铸法合成系列不同碳氮比的介孔类石墨相氮化碳材料CN-SBA15。通过N2吸附-脱附、XRD、TEM、FT-IR和XPS等对CN-SBA15进行表征,并考察其在苯甲醛和丙二腈Knoevenagel缩合反应中的催化性能。结果表明,CN-SBA15的比表面和孔体积与前驱体的比例有直接关系,很好地反向复制了原SBA-15的有序结构。CN-SBA15含有大量的N杂环结构,在Knoevenagel缩合反应中显示出较高的催化活性、重复使用性和底物普适性。     

Co掺杂对Ce/MCM-41和Ce/SBA-15催化剂催化氧化甲苯性能的影响

以分子筛为载体,采用等体积浸渍法制备Ce/SBA-15、Ce/MCM-41、Ce Co/SBA-15和Ce Co/MCM-41催化剂。用N2吸附-脱附、X射线衍射、扫描电子显微镜、H2程序升温还原、X射线光电子能谱和傅立叶变换红外光谱等对载体和催化剂进行表征,并考察催化剂催化氧化甲苯的活性。结果表明,与载体相比,随着Ce和Co的浸渍,催化剂的比表面积和孔容下降,但仍然保持了载体的有序介孔结构。引入的Ce和Co没有进入分子筛骨架,而是以立方相固溶体形式存在于分子筛表面和孔道中。催化剂催化氧化甲苯活性顺序依次为:Ce Co/SBA-15>Ce Co/MCM-41>Ce/MCM-41>Ce/SBA-15。共浸渍Ce和Co的催化剂活性明显优于只浸渍Ce的催化剂,活性与其还原性能直接相关,Ce Co/SBA-15催化剂具有最低的还原温度和最好的供氧能力,从而表现出最优的催化性能。     

Pore structure and graphitic surface nature of ordered mesoporous carbons probed by low-pressure nitrogen adsorption

Ordered mesoporous carbons (OMCs) were produced by pyrolysis of sucrose adsorbed in two different silica matrices (MCM-48 and SBA-15), followed by dissolution of the matrix in hydrofluoric acid. Subsequently, some of these OMCs were heat-treated at temperatures of up to 1600 °C. The OMC pore structure was studied by low-pressure nitrogen adsorption. Information on the graphitic order of the surface of the mesopore walls was also obtained from the nitrogen adsorption data. These results were correlated to the order of the graphene layers at the outer surface, which was studied by X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS).

The OMCs were predominantly mesoporous, but they also contained micropores. For OMCs produced in an SBA-15 matrix, the micropore volume decreased upon heating. After heating to 1600 °C, nearly all micropores had disappeared. Furthermore, upon heating the width of the mesopores increased from 35 to 50 Å. All these changes can be explained by a shrinking of the OMC framework upon heating. A different behavior was found for OMCs derived from MCM-48. Upon heating these materials at increasingly high temperatures, the width of the mesopores first decreased, and for temperatures above 1100 °C it increased again. For all OMCs studied the graphitic order of the mesopores and the order of the graphene layers at the outer surface increased upon heating. For a given temperature, the graphitic surface order of OMCs derived from SBA-15 and MCM-48 was similar.     

Simultaneous control of rod length and pore diameter of SBA-15 for PPL loading

Mesoporous silica materials are attractive materials for immobilizing enzymes because of their well-ordered structures, large surface area are pore volume. Diffusion of large enzyme molecules such as porcine pancreatic lipase (PPL) through the lengthy channels of MPS takes place too slowly. Therefore, the squat of the enzyme at the pore mouth entrance, actually makes the rest of the channel useless. In this study, to overcome this problem, synthesis parameters of SBA-15 were changed, since along with pore diameter increasing, the mesochannel length becomes shorter. The main point to obtain a well-ordered 2D hexagonal pore structure was the pre-hydrolysis of tetraethyl orthosilicate (TEOS) before the addition of 1,3,5-trimethyl benzene as a micelle swelling agent. Due to the strong effect of zirconium in changing the morphology of SBA-15 particles, we modified SBA-15 in the presence of a small amount of ZrOCl₂ in the synthesis solution under acidic conditions. As a result, mesochannel length of SBA-15-Zr was shortened from 600 to <200 nm. The morphology of mesoporous silica was also changed from rod-like to platelet, because of the accelerating effect of Zr(IV) on the self-assembly rate of P123 and TEOS condensation. Characteristic results conducted by low angle XRD, high resolution transmission electron microscopy and nitrogen adsorption, confirmed tuning effect of Zr(IV) in SBA-15. Furthermore, it was shown that the number of pore entrances increases with decreasing the length of SBA-15 mesochannels, leading to obvious improvement of enzyme uptake. PPL has been successfully immobilized in the mesoporous channels of SBA-15-Zr. The total amount of lipase adsorbed on the mesoporous SBA-15-Zr was measured by thermal gravimetric analysis. The largest PPL adsorption capacity was 784 mg/g belonging to the SBA-15-Zr with the length of 150 nm and the mean pore size diameter of 9.22 nm.     

Catalytic Behavior of Alumina-Promoted Sulfated Zirconia Supported on Mesoporous Silica in Butane Isomerization

Alumina-promoted sulfated zirconia was supported on mesoporous molecular sieves of pure-silica MCM-41 and SBA-15. The catalysts were prepared by direct impregnation of metal sulfate onto the as-synthesized MCM-41 and SBA-15 materials, followed by solid state dispersion and thermal decomposition. Measurements of XRD and nitrogen adsorption isotherms showed that the structures of resultant materials retain well-ordered pores, even with ZrO₂ loading as high as 50 wt%. The characterization results indicated that most of the promoted sulfated zirconia were well dispersed on the internal surface of the ordered mesopores. The catalytic behavior of the alumina-promoted sulfated zirconia supported on mesoporous silica was studied in n-butane isomerization. The supports of mesoporous structures led to high dispersion of sulfated zirconia in the meta-stable tetragonal phase, which was the catalytic active phase. The high performance of alumina-promoted catalysts was ascribed to the sulfur retention by alumina.     

Applications of Amine-functionalized Mesoporous Silica in Fine Chemical Synthesis

SBA-15 silica containing homogeneously distributed amine-functional groups and of fiber or platelet morphology was prepared through a modified co-condensation method using P123 copolymer as template under acidic condition. Synthetic factors which led to well-ordered mesoporous materials with high loadings of various amine groups were discussed. The resultant mesoporous materials were efficient base catalysts in Knoevenagel and Claisen–Schmidt addition reactions. The activities over SBA-15 materials with different amino-functional groups are compared. Moreover, the advantage of ordered large mesopores of SBA-15 in catalyzing liquid phase reactions was demonstrated, and the reaction rate could be further increased when SBA-15 was with platelet morphology and short mesochannels.     

介孔材料催化合成芳酮的应用进展

综述了介孔材料合成芳酮的催化效果及应用进展。着重介绍了几种具有代表性的介孔材料MCM-41、SBA-15、HMS及其改性对芳酮的收率和选择性的影响。芳烃主要有苯环、萘环、杂环化合物,酰化试剂为羧酸、酸酐和酰氯。简述了催化剂失活的原因,结果表明,不同结构的介孔材料对不同的酰化反应具有不同的催化活性。     

The porosity and morphology of mesoporous silica agglomerates

The synthesis of mesoporous MCM-41 silica materials was investigated at various conditions. A series of ordered mesopores MCM-41 silica materials was synthesized in concentrated reaction mixtures. The influence of water concentration at the constant ratio of the remaining reagents on the morphology and structural parameters of MCM-41 was studied. Hexadecyltrimethylammonium bromide CTAB was used as a structure-directing agent. The pore size, the wall thickness and cylindrical pores array were characterized by powder X-ray diffraction and nitrogen adsorption. The presented results show that in concentrated reaction mixtures, the pore size and the thickness of the pore walls remain practically constant. However, the dimensions of silica particles depend strongly on the water concentration. A high regularity of pore structure for large MCM-41 particles synthesized in concentrated solution was supported by independent AFM technique.     

Mesoporous silicas containing carboxylic acid: Preparation,thermal degradation,and catalytic performance

The calcination and thermal degradation behaviors of surfactants in mesoporous silicas SBA-15 and MCM-41 were investigated by FT-IR, ¹³C CP/MAS NMR, TG/DTA, and GPC. It was found that carboxylic acid-containing products were generated as active components in the mesopores of SBA-15 and MCM-41 from the triblock copolymer (PEO)₂₀(PPO)₇₀(PEO)₂₀ and cetyltrimethylammonium bromide (CTAB), respectively; the latter materials were used as templates. The carboxylic acid-containing mesoporous silica obtained showed a catalytic activity for hydrolysis of sucrose. The acidity was evaluated by means of NaOH titration. The acidity sensitively depended on both the calcination temperature and the atmosphere; the maximum appeared at 150 °C in air for SBA-15 where the highest activity was observed. However, the product in MCM-41 showed a lower catalytic activity than that in SBA-15. The SBA-15 product was easily leached from the mesopores of SBA-15 into the solution, but the degree of leaching for MCM-41 was considerably smaller than that for SBA-15.     

Mesoporous Silica–Zirconia Systems for Catalytic Applications

In this study synthesis and characterization of solid acid catalysts with definite textural properties (high surface area, narrow pore size dimension, ordered structure) are described. In particular sulphated zirconia (SZ) has been introduced on three ordered mesoporous silica, MCM-41, MCM-48 and SBA-15, in order to study the influence of silica supports on textural and chemical–physical properties of final catalysts. The correlation between the catalytic behavior of SZ supported samples and their textural and chemical physical properties was studied in the liquid-phase acylation of anisole with benzoic anhydride.     

Ordered Mesoporous Materials with Improved Stability and Catalytic Activity

Microporous crystals of zeolites such as Y, Beta, and ZSM-5 are widely used commercial catalysts, but their applications are strongly limited by their small pore sizes. Recent progress in solving this is used to ordered mesoporous materials such as MCM-41, HMS, and SBA-15. These mesoporous materials have pore diameters of 2.0–30 nm and exhibit good catalytic properties for the catalytic conversion of bulky reactants. However, when compared with microporous crystals of zeolites, the catalytic activity and hydrothermal stability are relatively low, which severely hinders their practical applications in industrial catalytic reactions such as petroleum cracking. The relatively low catalytic activity and hydrothermal stability can be attributed to the amorphous nature of the mesoporous walls. In this account, we systemically review the routes for improving catalytic activity and hydrothermal stability of mesoporous materials, which include (1) acidic sulfated zirconia supported in mesoporous materials; (2) strongly acidic and thermally stable mesostructured sulfated zirconia with tetragonal crystalline phase; (3) strongly acidic and hydrothermally stable mesoporous aluminosilicates synthesized in alkaline media; (4) strongly acidic and hydrothermally stable mesoporous aluminosilicates synthesized in strongly acidic media; (5) hydrothermally stable mesoporous titanosilicates with catalytically active titanium species in oxidations; (6) high-temperature generalized synthesis of ultrastable ordered mesoporous silica-based materials by using fluorocarbonhydrocarbon surfactant mixtures.     

One-pot hydrothermal preparation of SBA-15 supported Keggin-type 12-tungstophosphoric heteropolyacid mesoporous material and its bifunctional catalytic performance

In this work, a series of 12-tungstophosphoric acid (HPW) catalysts supported on mesoporous molecular sieves SBA-15 were prepared by a one-pot hydrothermal method and their physical and chemical properties were characterized by various techniques such as fourier transform infrared spectroscopy, powder X-ray diffraction, nitrogen adsorption–desorption and transmission electron microscopy. It has been found that all the catalysts retained the mesopore structure of SBA-15 and the primary Keggin-type structure of heteropoly acid. The surface areas and pore volumes of HPW-SBA-15 decreased with the increase of HPW heteropoly acid loadings. HPW units were mostly encapsulated inside the mesopores of SBA-15. The prepared catalysts showed excellent multifunctional catalytic properties. Their bifunctional catalytic performances were examined by photo-catalytic degradation of rhodamine-B dye and microwave-catalytic synthesis of isoamyl acetate. The sample with 20 wt% loading of 12-tungstophosphoric acid was found to be more active than the other catalysts under the photo and microwave-catalytic reaction conditions. Accordingly, reasons for the catalytic activity difference were simply explicated by the effect of HPW concentration on the physicochemical characteristic of HPW-SBA-15 catalysts such as surface areas, porosity, and mesostructure.     

Ethylene polymerization catalyzed by metallocene supported on mesoporous materials

Summary  In this work, different mesoporous materials were employed for the preparation of supported metallocene catalysts to be evaluated in ethylene polymerization and their performance was related to the chemistry of the materials surface used as support. The supports employed were MCM-41, SBA-15 and mesoporous TiO₂. The performance of the prepared catalysts was compared with the homogeneous catalyst precursor system. Those mesoporous materials, as well as the prepared metallocene catalysts, were analyzed by infrared absorption spectrometry (FTIR). Polymers were also characterized by FTIR, for the determination of the number-average molecular weight, and by differential scanning calorimetry (DSC) to determine thermal characteristics of the produced polyethylene. Among the studied metallocene supported catalysts, the one based on the mesoporous support SBA-15 achieved the highest activities, almost as high as that observed for the homogeneous system.     

Highly Effective Oxidative Dehydrogenation of Propane Over Vanadia Supported on Mesoporous SBA-15 Silica

Vanadia-containing mesoporous SBA-15 catalysts were prepared and characterized for the oxidative dehydrogenation (ODH) of propane. It is demonstrated that the vanadia-supported SBA-15 catalysts exhibit a much higher catalytic activity than those reported in the literature obtained over vanadium-supported mesoporous MCM-41 catalysts in the ODH of propane. The high catalytic performance of the mesoporous SBA-15 catalysts is attributed to the particularly large pore diameters and low surface acidity.     

Total Oxidation of Naphthalene Using Mesoporous CeO2 Catalysts Synthesized by Nanocasting from Two Dimensional SBA-15 and Three Dimensional KIT-6 and MCM-48 Silica Templates

Ceria catalysts have been prepared by a nanocasting procedure using SBA-15, MCM-48 and KIT-6 silica-based templates, and investigated for the total oxidation of naphthalene. In all cases cubic fluorite CeO₂ was prepared, and the structure of the template was replicated when SBA-15 and MCM-48 were used. The KIT-6 template was not replicated by the nanocasting synthesis, but in all cases mesoporous CeO2 was obtained with high surface areas (91–190 m² g^?1). All of the catalysts demonstrated high activity for naphthalene oxidation to CO₂, and the most active was the catalyst prepared from the KIT-6 template. The high activity was attributed to the small crystallite size of the CeO₂, combined with high surface area and the highly accessible catalyst surface.     

Synthesis of hexagonal and cubic mesoporous silica using power plant bottom ash

An alkali fusion method was adopted to extract silicate species from coal bottom ash in a power plant and the supernatant solution was used for the synthesis of MCM-41, SBA-15, and SBA-16 mesoporous silica materials. The minor impurities present in the bottom ash were not found to be detrimental to the successful formation of mesoporous silica phases. Additional silica from sodium metasilicate was introduced to improve the textural properties for SBA-15 and SBA-16. According to SEM analyses, particle morphology of the samples gradually approaches those prepared using pure chemical as the amount of external silica source increases. XRD analyses confirmed well-ordered mesostructures in all of these silica materials. N₂ adsorption–desorption isotherms of MCM-41 prepared using bottom ash showed a type IV isotherm with a region of steep increase due to capillary condensation, whilst SBA-15 and SBA-16 showed type IV isotherm with H1 and H2 hysteresis loops, respectively. ²⁷Al MAS NMR analysis of MCM-41 synthesized from the supernatant solution reveals that the extracted Al species from bottom ash were tetrahedrally incorporated in the framework. TEM clearly showed the uniform pore structure of the materials prepared using the industrial waste.     

Indene epoxidation over immobilized methyltrioxorhenium on MCM-41 silica,fumed silica and aluminosilicate materials

The presented report focuses on the testing of heterogenized methyltrioxorhenium (MTO) in indene epoxidation. A range of mesoporous materials with different SiO₂/Al₂O₃ ratios, namely aluminosilicates type Siral and MCM-41 silica and fumed silica, were used as supports for immobilization of MTO. The tested support materials and prepared catalytic systems exhibited high surface area, well-defined regular structure and narrow pore size distribution of mesopores and therefore represent good quality catalysts for various reactions. The immobilized MTO on various supports was tested for the preparation of 1,2-epoxyindane using two forms of hydrogen peroxide as oxidation agents, namely aqueous solution of hydrogen peroxide and its anhydrous form, urea-hydrogen peroxide. The prepared catalysts were successfully used for the preparation of 1,2-epoxyindane with achieved 100 % selectivities to the desired product at high conversions of indene.