Catalysis Science & Technology Blog

Carbon dioxide is one of the major contributors to global climate change and there are mounting concerns over the emission of such greenhouse gases.  Research into the reduction of CO₂ emissions is widespread.  The development of technologies to generate renewable energies is the most desirable way in the long term.

However, at present, these technologies are not able to replace existing fossil fuel-based power generation. Recent innovations have made the photocatalysis technology a potentially promising alternative.

Now, in this Catalysis Science & Technology Hot Article, Pratim Biswas et al., from Washington University in St. Louis, USA describe, for the first time, the rapid and direct synthesis of nanostructured copper-doped titania–silica (Cu–TiO₂–SiO₂) composite particles for CO₂ photoreduction using a furnace aerosol reactor (FuAR). This method is both simple and effective, with an extremely short processing time ( several seconds).

Read the article for free here.

Rapid synthesis of nanostructured Cu–TiO2–SiO2 composites for CO2 photoreduction by evaporation driven self-assembly
Wei-Ning Wang, Jinho Park and Pratim Biswas
Catal. Sci. Technol., 2011, Advance Article, DOI: 10.1039/C0CY00091D

In this new Catalysis Science & Technology Hot Article, Piet van Leeuwen et al. describe their investigation into the H-transfer activity of secondary phosphine oxide (SPO) complexes.  The key feature is the heterolytic transfer of the two hydrogens as H+ to the O of P=O, and H- to the metal. They found that rhodium SPO complexes yielded active and enantioselective catalysts, which was supported by DFT calculations.

SPOs act as ligands in their trivalent phosphinous acid tautomeric form. Their metal-to-phosphorus bond is comparable in strength to that of phosphines and they are often used as monodentate ligands, but more often as bidentate and tridentate ligands towards transition metals connected via their oxygen atoms by protons or hard metals.

Read more about these new ligands for free until 29th March 2011, here.

SPOs as new ligands in Rh(III) catalyzed enantioselective transfer
hydrogenation
Pascal M. Castro, Henrik Gulyas, Jordi Benet-Buchholz, Carles Bo,
Zoraida Freixa and Piet W. N. M. van Leeuwen
Catal. Sci. Technol., 2011, Advance Article, DOI:10.1039/C0CY00022A

A new Catalysis Science & Technology communication describing the synthesis of furans and pyrroles via alkyne hydration using a gold catalyst.

Nolan et al. found that a gold complex (when activated with a Bronsted acid) was a convinient pre-catalyst for the synthesis of heterocycles with furans being prepared in high yields under mild conditions than with other gold(I) catalysts.

Heterocycles are important motifs in pharmaceutical and agrochemical compounds.  Numerous strategies have been employed for synthesising them.  In recent years the use of gold catalysts has increased due to gold complexes being powerful catalytic tools.

Read more about this fascinating topic here.

Gold(I)-catalyzed synthesis of furans and pyrroles via alkyne hydration
Pierrick Nun, Stephanie Dupuy, Sylvian Gaillard, Albert Poater, Luigi Cavallo, Steven P. Nolan
Catal. Sci. Technol., 2011, Advance Article, DOI: 10.1039/c0cy00055h