posted on 2022-01-31, 18:47authored byAhsan Jalal, Yuxin Zhao, Alper Uzun
A family of carbon-embedded copper
catalysts was synthesized by
pyrolyzing copper benzene-1,3,5-tricarboxylate (Cu-BTC) at various
temperatures ranging from 400 to 900 °C. Characterization of
catalysts demonstrated that the density of defect sites on the carbon
support increases with an increase in the pyrolysis temperature leading
to an increase in the electron density on the copper sites. Catalytic
performance tests on 1,3-butadiene hydrogenation showed that the performance
becomes more stable as the pyrolysis temperature increases above 800
°C such that the catalyst prepared by pyrolysis at 900 °C
provided a stable performance for more than 12 h, while the one prepared
at 400 °C was deactivating by >25%. Data further demonstrated
a strong dependence of the turnover frequencies to the defect site
density on the carbonaceous layer. These results present a versatile
approach for preparing carbon-embedded copper catalysts with tunable
electronic structure and consequent catalytic properties.