Atomically Dispersed Vanadium Sites Anchored on N-Doped Porous Carbon for the Efficient Oxidative Coupling of Amines to Imines

Single-atom catalysts effectively integrate the respective advantages of homogeneous and heterogeneous catalysts and are a pioneering research frontier in catalysis by virtue of their maximized utility of metal atoms and distinct atomic configuration. However, development of such catalysts is still in the early stages. Herein, atomically dispersed vanadium (V) sites that are coordinated by N atoms and inlaid within N-incorporated porous carbon networks were prepared through a top-down strategy by annealing a V-containing metal–organic framework, NH2-MIL-101(V), followed by acid etching. The resulting V–N–C-600 catalyst exhibits unexpected catalytic reactivity, selectivity, and robust stability for the direct aerobic oxidation of benzylamine to generate N-benzylidene benzylamine with molecular oxygen under mild conditions. The turnover frequency reaches 53.9 h–1, which is much superior to those achieved over the commercial V2O5 and state-of-the-art non-noble metal heterogeneous catalysts reported in the literature. Kinetic analysis reveals a low activation energy barrier (37 kJ mol–1) for the benzylamine oxidation and indicates that a carbocationic intermediate is involved in the reaction mechanism. The synergistic effect between the isolated V single-atomic sites and N-doped hierarchically porous carbon network boosts the performance of V–N–C-600. Moreover, V–N–C-600 exhibits a wide generality for the efficient synthesis of a set of symmetrical imines, unsymmetrical imines, and imine derivatives.