Continuous Flow Synthesis of High Valuable N-Heterocycles via Catalytic Conversion of Levulinic Acid

• Published in: Frontiers in chemistry Vol. 7; p. 103
• Main Authors: Rodríguez-Padrón, Daily, Puente-Santiago, Alain R, Balu, Alina M, Muñoz-Batista, Mario J, Luque, Rafael
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Switzerland Frontiers Media S.A 26.02.2019
• Subjects: Chemistry; continuous flow; graphitic carbon nitride; heterogeneous catalysis; Levulinic acid; N-heterocycles; platinum; continuous flow; platinum; Levulinic acid; heterogeneous catalysis; N-heterocycles; graphitic carbon nitride
• ISSN: 2296-2646; 2296-2646
• DOI: 10.3389/fchem.2019.00103

Graphitic carbon nitride (g-C N ) was successfully functionalized with a low platinum loading to give rise to an effective and stable catalytic material. The synthesized g-C N /Pt was fully characterized by XRD, N physisorption, XPS, SEM-Mapping, and TEM techniques. Remarkably, XPS analysis revealed that Pt was in a dominant metallic state. In addition, XPS together with XRD and N physisorption measurements indicated that the g-C N preserves its native structure after the platinum deposition process. g-C N /Pt was applied to the catalytic conversion of levulinic acid to N-heterocycles under continuous flow conditions. Reaction parameters (temperature, pressure, and concentration of levulinic acid) were studied using 3 levels for each parameter, and the best conditions were employed for the analysis of the catalyst's stability. The catalytic system displayed high selectivity to 1-ethyl-5-methylpyrrolidin-2-one and outstanding stability after 3 h of reaction.