Baeyer-Villiger oxidation of cyclohexanone by molecular oxygen with Fe-Sn-O mixed oxides as catalysts

Fe-Sn-O mixed oxides were synthesized and used as catalysts for Baeyer-Villiger oxidation of cyclohexanone, which showed both high catalytic activity and selectivity. X-ray powder diffraction and scanning electron microscopy suggested that the Fe-Sn-O catalysts had a tetragonal structure with a grain size of 29.3nm. An epsilon-caprolactone yield as high as 98.8% was obtained in a small-scale experiment (5mmol of cyclohexanone). In a scale-up test (20mmol of cyclohexanone), the cyclohexanone conversion and epsilon-caprolactone yield were 96.7 and 96.5%, respectively. In addition, the catalysts can be reused five times without any major decline in catalytic activity. Copyright (c) 2015 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.