In situ encapsulated ultrafine Pd nanoparticles in nitrogen-doped porous carbon derived from hyper-crosslinked polymers effectively catalyse hydrogenation

An in-situ synthesis of Pd nanoparticles encapsulated in nitrogen-doped porous carbon from hyper-crosslinked polymers for improving catalytic hydrogenation is reported. • Ultrafine Pd NPs are in situ encapsulated in nitrogen-doped porous carbon. • The surface-covering carbon of Pd NPs can be removed upon H 2 O 2 treatment. • The obtained Pd/NPC-H 2 O 2 (1.3 nm) show the excellent selective hydrogenation. • The method could be a general approach to produce metals loaded porous carbon. Porous carbon-supported metal nanoparticles (NPs) with ultrafine size are of great importance in chemical industry, however, avoiding aggregation and retaining surface activity of these metal NPs is still challenging. In this work, the uniformly dispersed Pd NPs with the size of ca . 1.3 nm are successfully anchored in nitrogen-doped porous carbon (NPC) support via an in situ pyrolysis reduction strategy using nitrogen-doped hyper-crosslinked polymers and palladium acetate (Pd(OAc) 2 ) as precursors. Especially, upon H 2 O 2 post-treatment, the obtained Pd/NPC-H 2 O 2 (1.3 nm) composites show the excellent catalytic performance for the selective hydrogenation of furfural and quinoline . This newly developed strategy will open an avenue for the large-scale fabrication of active ultrafine metal loaded nanocomposites for various advanced applications.