Ceria nanocatalyst supported oxidative organic transformations of aromatic alcohols and p-nitrotoluene.

Hydrothermally derived nanocubes of CeO2 (10 nm) were explored as an efficient heterogeneous catalyst in the partial oxidation of aromatic alcohols to the corresponding aldehydes and aerobic oxidation of p-nitrotoluene to p-nitrobenzoic acid. CeO2 nanocatalyst was characterized by XRD, TEM, EDS, XPS, BET, FT-IR, TGA and UV-vis spectroscopy. TEM/HRTEM micrographs reveals the morphology with mostly cubic shaped nanostructures with exposed highly active {100} and {110} facets. Surface area of nanoceria determined by BET and found to be 33.8 m2/g. To demonstrate the universality of the catalytic system, the selective oxidation of different substrates of benzylic alcohol and complete oxidation of p-Nitrotoluene was investigated under mild conditions. Absolute selectivity towards their respective aldehydes was found to be 99.50% (benzaldehyde), 90.18% (p-chlorobenzaldehyde), 99.71% (p-nitrobenzaldehyde), 98.10% (p-fluorobenzaldehyde), 94.66% (p-anisaldehyde) and 86.14% (cinnamaldehyde). Moreover, the catalytic oxidative transformation of nitrotoluene results 100% conversion with 99.29% selectivity towards nitrobenzoic acid.