Visible light active Ag, N co-doped titania in the photo-oxidation of some 9-(N,N-dimethylaminomethyl)anthracene systems

Irradiated semiconductor catalysis in the presence of molecular oxygen can be admitted as an innovative and economical process for the conversion of harmful aromatics to less harmful products. The present work reports the preparation of a co-doped system by sonication assisted sol–gel technique followed by calcination at 500 °C and checks its activity in photo-oxidation reactions. The prepared system was characterized by various physico-chemical techniques such as X-ray diffraction, Raman spectroscopy, IR spectroscopy, TG-DTG, UV-DRS, SEM, and XPS. Thermal stability and structural identity were observed from TG and XRD measurements respectively. On reaction, Tertiary amine appended anthracene and its phenyl substituted derivative in CH3CN yielded Anthraquinone as the major product. Substituted Anthracenemethanamine reacted slowly and a relatively stable intermediate could be isolated at shorter periods of time. The products were separated and purified by column chromatography and the resultant products were characterized thoroughly by 1H NMR, IR spectroscopy and GCMS analysis.