Toward confined spaces in polymers and microemulsions for catalytic applications

Abstract

In biocatalysis impressive regio- and stereoselectivities are achieved via the directing influence of the three-dimensional structure of enzymes. As enzymes often suffer from limited pH stability, intolerance of organic solvents and perform only within a limited temperature range, the development of mesoporous support materials in which organometallic catalyst are introduced is targeted in the CRC 1333 “Molecular Heterogeneous Catalysis in Confined Geometries”. Thus, the first part of this study dealt with the synthesis of porous polystyrene (PS) and mesoporous PS/ZnO hybrid materials. Following the Nanofoams by Continuity-Inversion of Dispersion (NF-CID) method, in which colloidal crystals of polymer nanoparticles are foamed with supercritical CO2, porous PS polymers were synthesized in a first step. The results of this thesis show, that pore size, homogeneity, porosity, and morphology of the synthesized porous polymers can be adjusted by the size, polydispersity, and glass transition temperature of the PS nanoparticles as well as the foaming parameters. Open-cellular porous PS with pore size of the order of 50 nm was obtained by modifying the expansion step of the NF-CID method. To enhance the stability of the porous PS and finetune the pore size, the chemical bath deposition method was used to synthesize a mesoporous PS/ZnO hybrid material. Thereby, SEM images and EDX analysis confirm the formation of a thin layer of ZnO particles on the pore walls, while the general porous structure is retained. After the functionalization and anchoring of organometallic catalysts, these mesoporous PS/ZnO hybrid materials will be ready for the use in heterogeneous catalysis. In the second part of this study, the influence of liquid confinement on asymmetric Rh-catalysis was explored. As a benchmark reaction, the 1,2‐addition of boroxine 2 to N-tosylimine 1 in the presence of a [Rh/chiral diene ligands] complex was chosen. To create liquid-confinement, a reaction-specific microemulsion containing equal amounts of H2O/KOH and toluene/reactants was formulated using n‐octyl β‐ᴅ‐glucopyranoside (C8G1). A special feature of this nanostructured reaction medium is the presence of water- and toluene-rich compartments with a domain size of 5.5 nm. Performing the catalysis, a strong dependence on ligand type and reaction media was found. Especially for slightly polar diene ligands the liquid confinement provided by the microemulsion improved reaction rate, yield and enantioselectivity.