Porphyrin intercalation into a layered niobate derived from K4Nb6O17

The incorporation of guest species into two-dimensional inorganic structures can lead to materials with interesting chemical, catalytic, electronic, optical or mechanical properties. Concerning porphyrins and metalloporphyrins intercalation compounds, nanostructured materials have been obtained and evaluated in studies about photoprocess and catalytic reactions in confined media. The intercalation of bulky species such porphyrins into layered niobates is not easy to perform due to their high layer charge densities when compared to other layered materials. In this work we describe a method for TMPyP [5,10,15,20-tetrakis(1-methyl-4-pyridyl)-21H, 23H-porphyrin] intercalation into a layered niobate derived from K4Nb6O17. The potassium precursor was converted into the acidic-exchanged form and then intercalated with n-butylamine to produce an expanded material that was later used in the production of a dispersion containing exfoliated niobate sheets. The niobate dispersion was dropped into a porphyrin solution originating an organic-inorganic hybrid composite of formula TMPyP0.35H0.6K2Nb6O17·3H2O. XRD data suggest a tilted arrangement of the TMPyP ring with respect to the layers. Spectroscopic data (uv-visible absorption, fluorescence and resonance Raman) showed that TMPyP is intercalated in a non protonated form and that the interaction with the niobate layers surface is weak, corroborating with the proposed tilted orientation in the interlayer region.