Hydrophobized hollow TS-1 zeolite as pickering interfacial catalyst for selective oxidation reactions

Design of catalyst particles bearing excellent diffusion performance and suitable surface wettability is of great importance to the successful application of Pickering interfacial catalysis. In this study, selective oxidation reactions over hydrophobized hollow TS-1 zeolite were applied as probe reactions to investigate the influence of catalyst diffusion performance closely related to mesopore size on its catalytic activity. Hydrophobized hollow TS-1 zeolite particles were prepared via a post desilication treatment accompanied with precrystallization treatment. The synthesized hydrophobized hollow TS-1 zeolite was characterized by Scanning electron microscopy, Transmission electron microscopy, X-ray diffraction, UV–vis absorption spectrometry, Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy and Nitrogen adsorption-desorption. Stable Pickering emulsions including 1-hexene-hydrogen peroxide, cyclohexene-hydrogen peroxide and cyclohexanone-water were prepared with hydrophobized hollow TS-1 zeolite particles as emulsifier. HTS-1–393(2)-S zeolite synthesized with precrystallization at 393 K for 2 h presented the maximum values of 43.9 mol/(Ti-mol·h) for 1-hexene epoxidation, 15.7 mol/(Ti-mol·h) for cyclohexene epoxidation and 247.3 mol/(Ti-mol·h) for cyclohexanone ammoximation. In addition, HTS-1–393(2)-S zeolite particles displayed good reusability for more than five cycles.