Sol-Gel Synthesis of Organically Modified Silica Particles as Efficient Palladium Catalyst Supports to Perform Hydrogenation Process

Modern approaches to the production of new materials require the improvement of synthesis techniques towards simplifying the processes of their preparation and reducing the number of stages. Thus, in this study, one-stage synthesis of organomodified silica materials is developed using a special surfactant—dodecyldimethylamin N-oxide (DDAO). The peculiarity of this approach is that there is no need for heat treatment of the material, since DDAO is removed by washing in alcohol. Amino-, mercapto-, methyl-, and phenyl-modified silicas were synthesized using this method. The SEM images showed the morphology of all the obtained materials is close, all particles are spherical, and the diameter of individual particles is about 500 nm. Palladium particles were precipitated on these supports, then the experiments were carried out to study the catalytic activity of these materials in a model reaction of nitroaniline reduction. The phenyl modified matrix-based materials showed very low activity. This is due to the fact that the support and the substrate contain aromatic fragments, thus, hydrophobic interactions arise between them, which complicates the diffusion of the products. The leader is a matrix with an amino fragment, which is associated with its electron-donor effect. The XPS method revealed the amount of fixed palladium, as well as the binding energy shifts, which are 0.68 eV for 5% Pd/SiO2–C6H5; 0.56 eV for 5% Pd/SiO2–C3H6–NH2; 0.26 eV for 5% Pd/SiO2–CH3; and 0.13 eV for 5% Pd/SiO2.