Electronic modulation induced by oxygen vacancy creating in copper oxides toward accelerated hydrogenation kinetics of nitroaromatics

The development of advanced catalysts is of vital importance for chemical production, and vacancy engineering represents an effective approach to improve the overall catalytical activities by modulating their structural characters. Herein, a series of oxygen-vacancy-functionalized copper oxides were effectively prepared through a hydrothermal-oxidative tandem process. The optimized CuO-S30 catalyst shows an exceptionally-improved catalytical performance for the selective hydrogenation of 4-nitrophenol (4-NP) with good reusability. With the assistance of theoretical simulation, the exceptional activity can be attributed to the electronic modulation induced by oxygen vacancies in CuO-S30, which could not only facilitate the trapping of the reactants on the positively charged Cu sites, but also promote the electron transfer during the hydrogenation process. This study offers a facile and environmentally friendly strategy for electronic property modulation in metal oxides by oxygen vacancies construction, which can be further extended to other advanced catalysts with outstanding catalytic properties.