Effective synthesis of 5-amino-1-pentanol by reductive amination of biomass-derived 2-hydroxytetrahydropyran over supported Ni catalysts

A highly efficient and green process was developed for the synthesis of useful 5-amino-1-pentanol(5-AP)from biomass-derived dihydropyran by coupling the in situ generation of 5-hydroxypentanal(5-HP,via the ring-opening tautomerization of 2-hydroxytetrahydropyran(2-HTHP))and its reductive amination over supported Ni catalysts.The catalytic performances of the supported Ni catalysts on different oxides including SiO2,TiO2,ZrO2,γ-Al2 O3,and MgO as well as several commercial hydrogenation catalysts were investigated.The Ni/ZrO2 catalyst presented the highest 5-AP yield.The characterization results of the oxide-supported Ni catalysts showed that the Ni/ZrO2 catalyst possessed high reducibility and a high surface acid density,which lead to the enhanced activity and selectivity of the catalyst.The effect of reaction parameters on the catalytic performance of the Ni/ZrO2 catalyst was studied,and a high 5-AP yield of 90.8%was achieved in the reductive amination of 2-HTHP aqueous solution under mild conditions of 80℃and 2 MPa H2.The stability of the Ni/ZrO2 catalyst was studied using a continuous flow reactor,and only a slight decrease in the 5-AP yield was observed after a 90-h time-on-stream.Additionally,the reaction pathways for the reductive amination of 2-HTHP to synthesize 5-AP were proposed.