Hollow UiO‐66‐NH2 encapsulated Pd catalysts for highly selective hydrogenation of furfural to furfuryl alcohol

Abstract The selective hydrogenation of furfural (FFA) to furfuryl alcohol (FA) is regarded as attractive transformation to achieve the sustainable synthesis of value‐added chemicals from biomass resources. However, the conventional supported catalysts are significantly restricted by their narrow pore size, ununiform dispersion and easy leaching or aggregation of catalytic sites. Herein, we designed hollow UiO‐66‐NH 2 as the support to encapsulate Pd nanoparticles (Pd@H‐UiO‐66‐NH 2 ) to achieve the highly active and selective conversion of FFA to FA. Benefiting from the void‐confinement effect and substrate enrichment of hollow structure, as well as the surface wrinkles, the as‐prepared catalyst Pd@H‐UiO‐66‐NH 2 exhibited 96.8 % conversion of FFA with satisfactory selectivity reaching up to 92.4 % at 80 °C, 0.5 MPa H 2 in isopropanol solvent within 6 h. More importantly, as‐prepared Pd@H‐UiO‐66‐NH 2 catalyst exhibited excellent long‐term stability, as well as good universality toward a series of hydrogenation of unsaturated hydrocarbons.