Protonated and layered transition metal oxides as solid acids for dehydration of biomass-based fructose into 5-hydroxymethylfurfural

A serial of protonated and layered transition metal oxides, including layered HTaWO6, HNbMoO6 as well as HNbWO6, were synthesized by solid-state reaction and ion-exchange. The layered HTaWO6 has been systematically studied as a solid acid to realize the dehydration of fructose to 5-hydroxymethylfurfural (HMF). The transition metal oxide samples were characterized with ICP-OES, EDS, XRD, XPS, SEM, TGA, FT-IR, N-2 adsorption-desorption and NH3-TPD. The influential factors such as reaction temperature, reaction time, solvent, catalyst amount and substrate concentration were deeply investigated. The optimized fructose conversion rate of 99% with HMF yield of 67% were achieved after 30 min at 140 degrees C in dimethylsulfoxide. (C) 2016 Science Press and Dalian Institute of Chemical Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences. Published by Elsevier B.V. and Science Press. All rights reserved.