Manganese dioxide supported on hollow graphitized carbon spheres for the catalytic oxidation of toluene: Improved adsorption and electron transfer

It would be beneficial to design transition metal-based catalysts having large surface areas and good electron transmission efficiency to replace expensive noble metal-based catalysts. In this work, hollow graphitized carbon spheres loaded with MnO2 nanosheets were prepared by a simple two step hydrothermal method. The large surface area and excellent conductivity promote the catalytic oxidation of toluene. The optimized catalyst degraded 90 % of 500 ppm-toluene at 180 °C and so out-performed some noble metal-based catalysts. The working mechanism and intermediates are also explained in detail. This study demonstrates that the adsorption capacity and conductivity of a carbon-based support prepared by a simple process can promote catalytic performance and is expected to assist in the development of high-performance transition metal oxide catalysts for volatile organic compound remediation.