Highly selective transfer hydrogenation of furfural into furfuryl alcohol by interfacial frustrated Lewis pairs on CeO2

The development of metal-free strategies for selective transfer hydrogenation is of particular interest in the conversion of biomass. Herein, the interfacial frustrated Lewis pairs (FLPs) constructed in CeO2(1 1 0) surface have been successfully demonstrated as novel catalytic active sites for the highly selective transfer hydrogenation. The defect-enriched porous nanorods of CeO2 with interfacial FLP sites show the >99.0% selectivity at 95.2% conversion for transfer hydrogenation of furfural to furfuryl alcohol. Mechanism investigations exhibit that the interfacial FLP sites can simultaneously activate furfural and isopropanol, which benefits the enhanced catalytic activity. While, the strong adsorption of aldehyde compounds on the interfacial FLP sites results in the improved hydrogenation and the suppressed pathway of the side-reaction, thereby achieving the superior catalytic selectivity. Such interfacial FLP sites exhibit the great potentials for the selective transfer hydrogenation of various unsaturated compounds.