In situ MAS NMR investigations of molecular sieves and zeolite-catalyzed reactions

Solid-state MAS NMR is a powerful technique to study heterogeneous catalysts and the way by which they operate. In situ MAS NMR has been demonstrated to be a powerful method to understand reaction mechanisms, to study the nature, dynamics and reactivity of surface intermediates and active sites, and to characterize structural modifications in the catalyst itself, in particular when using C-13 strategically labelled substrates. In this paper, three examples selected from our own work are used to illustrate the potential of in situ MAS NMR. They are the formation of cumene and its isomerization to n-propylbenzene on zeolite H-ZSM-11, the activation of propane at low temperature and the alkylation of benzene with propane on zeolite H-ZSM-5, and the characterization of the aluminophosphate molecular sieve VPI-5 structure with temperature. Studies of the alkylation of benzene with propene confirmed that cumene was the primary reaction product. The undesired n-propylbenzene by-product results from the intermolecular reaction between cumene and benzene, enhanced by molecular shape-selective effects in medium pore size zeolites (e.g., H-ZSM-11). It explains why large pore zeolites, e.g., zeolite Beta, are used commercially today for this process. Propane can be activated at low temperature (ca. 573 K) on bifunctional medium pore size zeolites possessing intimately related acidic Bronsted sites and a dehydrogenation function provided by Ga or Zn species. In Ga/H-ZSM-5 catalysts, at 573 K, the activation of propane was shown to occur via a protonated pseudocyclopropane (PPCP) intermediate (or transition state). The latter evolves in a manner that can be formally described by the formation of CH3+, C2H5+, and C3H7+ carbenium ion intermediates. These species can react with olefins, alkanes, or other electron-rich molecules such as benzene. The primary reaction products of the reaction of propane with benzene are n-propylbenzene (in small amount), ethylbenzene and toluene. Their subsequent reactions lead eventually to toluene and xylenes as the final products. In the structural characterization of VPI-5, Al-27, P-31, and Al-27 nutation MAS NMR spectra show that, at 294 K, fully hydrated VPI-5 contains three equally populated Al and P crystallographic sites and that one-third of Al is 6-coordinate. The VPI-5 structure then belongs to the P6(3) space group. Above 353 K, VPI-5, fully or partially hydrated, undergoes a structural transformation to a higher framework symmetry, i.e., the P6(3)cm space group. The transformation occurs at nearly the same temperature in both cases, indicating that the breakdown of the hydrogen-bonded helical water structure inside the VPI-5 pores is not a factor in the process.