Two-dimensional porous Cu-CuO nanosheets: Integration of heterojunction and morphology engineering to achieve high-effective and stable reduction of the aromatic nitro-compounds

The morphology and heterojunction engineering are effective ways to boost the performance of Cubased catalysts. Herein, we have reported the designed synthesis of two-dimensional Cu-Cu O heterojunction nanosheets(2D Cu-Cu O NS) based on 3-aminopropyl-triethoxysilane(APTES, KH550) aided synthetic strategy. The APTES can act as both the ligand and alkali(-OH) source to guide the large-scale synthesis of 2D Cu-based precursor, which can transform into 2D Cu-Cu O NS by the controllable post-treatment.The Si species from APTES can protect the particles from the severe aggregation and growth, guaranteeing the formation of 2D sheets composed of small-sized Cu-Cu O heterojunction(about 20 nm). The heterojunction interfaces can provide plentiful active sites to boost the catalytic ability. The 2D sheets can provide large accessible surface, being conducive to the contact of the catalyst and reactants. Benefiting from above virtues, the 2D Cu-Cu O NS showed the superior catalytic performance for the reduction of a series of nitro compounds, being superior to most reported non-noble metal-based catalysts. Notably,it exhibited good re-cycled performance with no obvious performance degradation after 10 consecutive catalysis. The present study will be promising to promote the application of the Cu-based catalysts, due to its ability to control the morphology and potential for the large-scale synthesis.

Morphological and heterojunctional engineering of two-dimensional porous Mo-Ni based catalysts for highly effective catalytic reduction of aromatic nitro compounds

Hydrogenation reactions play crucial roles on chemical synthesis and pollutant elimination.The improvement of the ability to activate reactants and increase of the contact probability between the catalysts and reactants are positive to improve the catalytic performance.Herein,we have reported the design of two-dimensional porous Ni-Ni_(3)N-Ni Mo N heterojunction sheets(2D Mo-Ni based nanosheets)for efficient catalytic hydrogenation of the aromatic nitro-compounds.The heterojunction interfaces provide plentiful active sites to improve the activating ability of the catalyst on the reactants.Additionally,the 2D porous structure facilitates not only the contact of catalytic sites with reactants but also mass transfer and diffusion,both of which are favorable to accelerating the hydrogenation process.As a result,the optimized sample of 2D Mo-Ni sheet exhibits good activity for the hydrogenation of aromatic nitro-compounds by converting 0.2 mmol/L(30 mL)of p-nitrophenol to p-aminophenol within 45 s with good recyclability.The activation energy and the reaction rate at 25℃ is 31.11 k J/mol and 0.0796 s^(-1),respectively,both of which surpass most of reported non-noble metal catalysts and rivals with most noble metal-based catalysts.The combination of late and early transition metals provides an innovative way to obtain outstanding catalysts for the hydrogenation.