A Supported Palladium Phosphide Catalyst for the Wacker‐Tsuji‐Oxidation of Styrene
Arjun Neyyathala, Franziska Flecken, Schirin Hanf
Abstract
Abstract The substitution of pure metal particles by metal phosphides in catalysis represents a promising opportunity to lower the required metal quantity in the context of a sustainable use of metal resources. Herein we show the synthesis of palladium phosphide, Pd 3 P, supported on silica, which is tested as catalyst for the Wacker‐Tsuji‐oxidation of styrene to acetophenone. The synthesized catalyst is characterized by PXRD, SEM‐EDX, FTIR, ICP‐AES and XPS measurements. Four different reaction systems are investigated in this study including different co‐catalysts and reaction media. Conversions of styrene up to 95 % with a selectivity of 73 % towards acetophenone are observed using Pd 3 P/SiO 2 as catalyst, CuCl 2 as co‐catalyst and O 2 as oxidant. An enhanced selectivity up to 100 % towards acetophenone is obtained in other reaction systems. The use of Pd 3 P/SiO 2 leads to an optimized selectivity and conversion in the oxidation reaction in comparison with the purely Pd‐based system Pd/SiO 2 . These results give an insight on how the incorporation of phosphorus has a great effect on the performance of heterogeneous catalysts.