Dehydrogenation of Cyclohexanol to Cyclohexanone Over Nitrogen-doped Graphene supported Cu catalyst

Alyaa. K. Mageed (Department of Chemical Engineering, University of Technology, Baghdad)
Dayang A. B. Radiah (Department of Chemical and Environmental Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, Universiti Putra Malaysia, 43400, Serdang, Selangor)
A. Salmiaton (Department of Chemical and Environmental Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, Universiti Putra Malaysia, 43400, Serdang, Selangor)
Shamsul Izhar (Department of Chemical and Environmental Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, Universiti Putra Malaysia, 43400, Serdang, Selangor)
Musab Abdul Razak (Department of Chemical and Environmental Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, Universiti Putra Malaysia, 43400, Serdang, Selangor)
Bamidele Victor Ayodele (Institute of Energy Policy and Research, Universiti Tenaga Nasional, Jalan IKRAM-UNITEN 43000, Kajang, Selangor)

Bulletin of Chemical Reaction Engineering & Catalysis
2020: BCREC Volume 15 Issue 2 Year 2020 (August 2020)

In this study, the dehydrogenation of cyclohexanol to cyclohexanone over nitrogen-doped reduced graphene oxide (N-rGO) Cu catalyst has been reported. The N-rGO support was synthesized by chemical reduction of graphite oxide (GO). The synthesized N-rGO was used as a support to prepare the Cu/N-rGO catalyst via an incipient wet impregnation method. The as-prepared support and the Cu/N-rGO catalyst were characterized by FESEM, EDX, XRD, TEM, TGA, and Raman spectroscopy. The various characterization analysis revealed the suitability of the Cu/N-rGO as a heterogeneous catalyst that can be employed for the dehydrogenation of cyclohexanol to cyclohexanone. The catalytic activity of the Cu/N-rGO catalyst was tested in non-oxidative dehydrogenation of cyclohexanol to cyclohexanone using a stainless-steel fixed bed reactor. The effects of temperature, reactant flow rate, and time-on-stream on the activity of the Cu/N-rGO catalyst were examined. The Cu/N-rGO nanosheets show excellent catalytic activity and selectivity to cyclohexanone. The formation of stable Cu nanoparticles on N-rGO support interaction and segregation of Cu were crucial factors for the catalytic activity. The highest cyclohexanol conversion and selectivity of 93.3% and 82.7%, respectively, were obtained at a reaction temperature of 270 °C and cyclohexanol feed rate of 0.1 ml/min. Copyright © 2020 by Authors, Published by BCREC Group. This is an open access article under the CC BY-SA License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0).