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Design of a Nanoscale Ni Catalyst for Debenzylation Reactions via Hydrogenative C–N Bond Cleavage

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Abstract

Ni catalysts are commonly used for important transformations in organic chemistry. However, they frequently attend the employment as Ni complexes. Herein, we design an efficient and environmentally compatible nanoscale Ni catalyst for debenzylation reactions via hydrogenative C–N bond cleavage. The Ni nanoparticles (NPs) can be in situ generated by pure H2 reduction based on the precursor Ni–Al hydrotalcite-like compound. The Ni nanocatalysts were systematically characterized with various technique approaches including physical adsorption, XRD, Raman, H2-TPR, TEM, and SEM. Two types of Ni species can be detected, i.e., NiO and Ni0. The latter was supposed to be the active sites. The ultra-small and highly dispersed active Ni0 NPs with average diameters of 5 nm can be formed on the surface of the Ni–Al2O3–H2–78 catalyst. Then the complete conversion and high yield (> 90%) for hydrogenative C–N bond cleavage of some substrates (6 examples) can be achieved.

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Acknowledgements

This work is financially supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant No. 21503264), a key deployment project from Chinese academy of sciences, the Talent Program of Shanghai University of Engineering Science, Science and Technology Commission of Shanghai Municipality (Grant No. 18030501100).

Funding

National Natural Science Foundation of China, 21503264

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Author notes

  1. Shuang Liu, Wei Zhao and Zhantong Tang as joint first authors.

Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, Shanghai University of Engineering Science, Shanghai, 201620, China

    Shuang Liu, Wei Zhao, Zhantong Tang, Li Zhang, Kailiang Guo, Huishu Wang & Yong Men

  2. Shanghai Institute of Organic Chemistry, CAS, Shanghai, 200032, China

    Shuang Liu, Wei Zhao & Jun Yang

  3. Hualong Nuclear Power Technology Co., Ltd, Beijing, 100089, China

    Jun Dai

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  1. Shuang Liu
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Contributions

SL: Project administration, Conceptualization, Methodology, Supervision, Formal analysis, Writing-original draft, Writing-review & editing. WZ: Data curation, Investigation, Visualization. ZT: Investigation, Visualization, Validation. LZ: Data curation. KG: Validation. HW: Validation. YM: Conceptualization, Formal analysis. JY: Funding acquisition. JD: Validation.

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Correspondence to Shuang Liu or Jun Yang.

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Liu, S., Zhao, W., Tang, Z. et al. Design of a Nanoscale Ni Catalyst for Debenzylation Reactions via Hydrogenative C–N Bond Cleavage. Catal Lett 153, 3031–3043 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10562-022-04196-9

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