Efficient and Highly Selective Aqueous Oxidation of Sulfides to Sulfoxides at Room Temperature Catalysed by Supported Iron Oxide Nanoparticles on SBA‐15

Abstract

The present manuscript describes a simple, efficient and environmentally friendly room temperature aqueous catalytic approach to the selective preparation of sulfoxides from sulfides utilising lowloaded supported iron oxide nanoparticles and aqueous hydrogen peroxide as oxidant. Materials could be easily recovered from the reaction mixture and reused ten times without any loss in activity and no metal leaching was observed during the reaction. This is thus the first selective aqueous oxidation of sulfides using an iron-based heterogeneous system.

Oxidative esterification of alcohols and aldehydes using supported iron oxide nanoparticle catalysts

“…Supported iron oxide nanoparticles were utilized in the proposed oxidative esterification reaction, which have been previously reported as known Lewis acid and oxidation catalysts in various organic reactions [14,[16][17][18]. The mechanism of the reactions mainly involves the activation of the carbonyl oxygen by the iron oxide nanoparticles (oxidation) and the subsequent esterification with the alcohol promoted by the Lewis acidity of the catalyst.…”

“…The proposed nanocatalyst can be considered by-functional as both having Lewis acidity and redox activities (e.g. oxidation) depending on the reaction conditions [14,[16][17][18]. Because of the collective effect of Fe Lewis acidity and redox activity on the surface and the large number of available active sites for the reaction, the conversion rate becomes greater and hereby limited by kinetic factors such as steric hindrance [15].…”

“…The characteristics of the FeNP materials used herein are almost identical to those previously reported [14], including those after reaction/reuses and so will not be included in this contribution. NMR spectra of representative structures can be found in the Supplementary information.…”

“…The catalyst was prepared according to a previously established protocol [14]. The characteristics of the FeNP materials used herein are almost identical to those previously reported [14], including those after reaction/reuses and so will not be included in this contribution.…”

7.28 Oxidation of Sulfur, Selenium, and Tellurium

“…Fe(III) oxide nanoparticles, supported on mesoporous silica-type materials (SBA-15), provide a clean and complete oxidation of aryl alkyl sulfides to sulfoxides in water with H 2 O 2 as terminal oxidant at room temperature (Scheme 16). 162 Negligible leaching of the metal is observed and the heterogeneous catalyst, recovered after filtration, can be used for up to eight cycles of oxidation with the same efficiency.…”