SELECTIVE HYDROGENATION OF ORGANIC MOLECULES BY NICKEL NANOPARTICLES

Work package:
Abstract / work package / illustration & legend The goal of selective hydrogenation of organic molecules comprising different unsaturated groups is to selectively hydrogenate only one kind of unsaturated function. It is a very challenging, industrially relevant reaction that usually makes use of expensive noble metals such as Pt and Pd. While nickel is a much less expensive metal, it is in general less active than the noble metals. A way to regulate catalyst activity but also selectivity can be to create an interface between supported metal nanoparticles (MNPs) and a specific medium with adjustable properties, such as ionic liquids (ILs), which would allow controlling some of the key reaction parameters (metal dispersion, electron density, metal-support interaction). Indeed, ultrathin layers of ILs supported on porous supports either exhibit high intrinsic catalytic activity, or serve as peculiar solvents and stabilizers for an introduced active catalyst.[1] During this Master internship we will prepare Ni nanoparticles of different shapes by an organometallic method,[2] we will support them on solid supports (TiO2, graphene), and we will evaluate their catalytic performance in the selective hydrogenation of various alkynes (Scheme 1), before and after adding on the as prepared catalyst a thin layer of various ILs.