A Simple and Efficient Route to Active and Dispersed Silica Supported Palladium Nanoparticles

Various mesoporous silica supported Pd materials were prepared by different methodologies in order to control and optimize the metal nanoparticle sizes for catalytic applications. The catalytic activities (conversion, mol% and selectivity to methyl-cinnamate) of the supported palladium catalysts were investigated in the Heck reaction under microwave irradiation using various haloarenes. Pd materials prepared by co-precipitation exhibited a very poor activity in the Heck reaction compared to that of Pd impregnated samples. Impregnated materials prepared without the use of a specific reducing agent had comparable activities to those of APTS-NaBH4 reduced Pd materials, validating the simplicity of the methodology. High selectivities to methylcinnamate were obtained for all materials.