Selective Oxidation of Styrene on Nanostructured Cerium Vanadate Catalyst

Growing demand for benzaldehyde in recent years has prompted researchers to explore an environmentally sustainable process to synthesize it from abundant materials to replace the conventional toluene chlorination method. In that direction, benzaldehyde synthesis from the catalytic oxidative cleavage of styrene is attractive, as styrene is cheap and millions of tons are produced per year. Herein, cerium vanadate (CeVO4) is demonstrated as an outstanding catalyst for the synthesis of benzaldehyde from styrene oxidation at 80 °C. The particle-shaped (CeV NP), rod-shaped (CeV NR), and bar-shaped (CeV NB) nanostructured CeVO4 (CeV) are synthesized by varying the surfactants. All the catalysts exhibit favorable properties such as high surface area, surface charge, acidity, and oxygen vacancy, which are correlated to their catalytic performance. Among the morphologies, CeV NP shows the highest styrene conversion (99.5%) along with the highest benzaldehyde selectivity (84.2%). The nonleaching of catalyst further confirms the heterogeneous reaction process, which makes it a strong candidate for industrial purposes.