Ligand-Free One-Pot Synthesis of Ru/W₁₈O₄₉ Self-Assembled Hierarchical Coral-Like Nanostructures for Selective Conversion of Glucose into Glycols

In this study, we report a simple inorganic route for the synthesis of Ru/W₁₈O₄₉ self-assembled coral-like nanostructures, with the following advantages: It is one step and requires no surfactant or stabilizing agent; Ru loading is easily tuned, and the as-synthesized nanomaterials can be used as a catalyst without any further processing. The preliminary investigations of the catalytic performance of these as-synthesized Ru/W₁₈O₄₉ nanomaterials appear quite promising for converting glucose to glycols. The total glycol selectivity of 82.6% with 100% conversion of glucose was obtained over 0.03 wt % Ru loading on tungsten nanostructures, which turns out to be the lowest Ru loading% on support reported to date to achieve the highest total glycol selectivity among the previously reported catalyst based on Ru-nano/composite materials. Additionally, preliminary results show that the concentration of Ru on W₁₈O₄₉ significantly affects the selectivity of the glycol production. Thus, our methodology will open up a wide range of opportunities regarding the choice of metals, stoichiometric/nonstoichiometric WO_x (x=1–3) as support, and the viability of further catalytic manipulations. A probable catalytic mechanism for this catalytic process is also proposed.