PENG Jian-Bin^1*, DING Yan², TAN Rong², YIN Donghong², YU Ningya^2*

(1 Shunde Polytechnic, Shunde 528300, China; 2 Insititute of Fine Catalysis and Synthesis, Hunan Normal University, Changsha 410081, China)

Abstract: An amino-functionalized ionic liquid of N-(3-aminopropyl), N(3)-(vinyl)-imidazolium bromide (AIL) was synthesized and used to stabilize gold nanoparticles (GNPs). Further polymerization of the resultant GNP-containing AIL led to a composite catalyst (GNPs-P-AIL) in which GNPs were supported by ionic copolymer. The composite catalyst was characterized by means of Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy, ultraviolet-visible spectroscopy, and transmission electron microscopy. It was found that the structure of ionic liquid moieties in GNPs-P-AIL remained intact after the GNP loading and successive polymerization processes and that the GNPs in the composite catalyst dispersed uniformly with the particle size of 6~8 nm. GNPs-P-AIL showed good catalytic performance in the epoxidation of styrene using H₂O₂ as the oxidant. The conversion of styrene and the selectivity for styrene oxide were as high as 81.5% and 88.3%, respectively, provided that the epoxidation reaction was performed at 60 ℃ for 6h.

Key words: Amino-functionalized ionic liquid; gold nanoparticles; Polymerization; styrene; epoxidation

E-mail: sdpjb2005@126.com; yuningya@yahoo.com.cn

Journal of Molecular Catalysis, Vol. 24, Issue 6, 2010, 510~515.