Development of nickel-incorporated MCM-41-carbon composites and their application in nitrophenol reductionElectronic supplementary information (ESI) available. See DOI: 10.1039/c9ta02387a

• Main Authors: Ghimire, Pramila P, Zhang, Liping, Kinga, Unocic A, Guo, Qianying, Jiang, Baojiang, Jaroniec, Mietek
• Format: Journal Article
• Published: 16.04.2019
• ISSN: 2050-7488; 2050-7496
• DOI: 10.1039/c9ta02387a

MCM-41-carbon composites were obtained by soft-templating strategy by adding resorcinol and formaldehyde as carbon precursors during the synthesis of MCM-41. The synthesis of these composites was optimized until mesoporous MCM-41 domains remained highly ordered and the overall specific surface area and pore volume remained relatively high. The one-pot synthetic procedure was further extended to obtain the Ni-containing MCM-41-carbon composites using nickel nitrate as an additive. A homogeneous distribution of nickel nanoparticles in the composites was achieved by adding histidine to the reaction mixture, which was able to form a complex with nickel ion. Carbonization of organic components in the composites produced carbon that was responsible for in situ reduction of nickel( ii ) to metallic nickel (Ni 0 ) at elevated temperatures, eliminating the post-synthesis reduction step carried out in the presence of hydrogen gas or other reducing agent. The resulting composites showed enhanced catalytic activity toward nitrophenol reduction obeying the zero-order kinetics. Three unique features of the resulting composites, namely mesoporous channels of MCM-41, carbon-induced in situ reduction of Ni ions to metallic Ni nanoparticles, and abundance of highly active Ni sites due to high dispersion of Ni 0 , make this strategy applicable for the synthesis of other transition metal-based catalysts. XRD and STEM analyses revealed a homogeneous distribution of nickel nanoparticles in the composites without significant distortion of their ordered mesoporosity. Ni-MCM-41-carbon composites were obtained by the soft-templating synthesis of MCM-41 with addition of resorcinol, formaldehyde and nickel nitrate.