“Alcohol condensation reactions on thermally activated Mg-Al hydrotalcites”

JUANA I. DI COSIMO; VERÓNICA K. DÍEZ; CARLOS R. APESTEGUÍA

Santa Fe, Argentina

Simposio; 2nd. Symposium on Catalysis JICA-CENACA: Catálisis Aplicada al Control Ambiental y Química Fina; 1997

JICA-CENACA

The coupling and dehydrogenation of ethanol was used as a probe reaction for discriminating between the different reaction pathways involved in linear or branched alcohol synthesis from short-chain alcohols. A variety of physical and spectroscopic techniques were employed to quantify both the surface basic density and the strength of the acid-base pair sites present in Mg-Al mixed oxides. It was found that n-butanol, the ethanol condensation product, is selectively formed when the catalyst contains a proper combination of Mg2+ and Al3+ cations.