Direct epitaxial synthesis of magnetic biomass derived acid/base bifunctional zirconium-based hybrid for catalytic transfer hydrogenation of ethyl levulinate into γ-valerolactone

The development of efficient and reusable catalysts to improve the catalytic transfer hydrogenation (CTH) of biomass-derived platform molecules into high value-added chemicals is always desired. For this purpose, the magnetic Fe3O4@Zr-FDCA hybrid with Lewis acid and Lewis base sites was first designed by simple assembly of biomass derived 2,5-furandicarboxylic acid (FDCA) with zirconium and grown directly on the surface of carboxylated Fe3O4. The resulting Fe3O4@Zr-FDCA exhibited a unique core-shell structure with high specific surface area and proper acid/basic strength, it performed well in CTH reaction of diverse carbonyl compounds, especially for the conversion of ethyl levulinate to gamma-valerolactone with the yield of 94.5% at 180. C for 5 h. Furthermore, the good magnetic responsibility of Fe3O4@Zr-FDCA made it could be easily separated from the reaction mixture by an external magnet, and displayed a good reusability with no significant loss in the activity after reuse for five runs.