Constructing frustrated Lewis pairs on Mo-doped Fe2O3 catalyst to enhance oxidative desulfurization efficiency

Abstract

The emission of sulfur oxides will not only cause a series of environmental pollution but also threaten human health. At present, oxidative desulfurization is considered one of the technologies to achieve high-efficiency conversion of sulfur-containing compounds. Herein, the special frustrated Lewis pairs (FLPs) for efficient oxidative desulfurization are created by regulating surface doping in a redox iron-based oxide. According to experimental results, the Lewis acidic sites can be considered as the iron atoms adjacent to the molybdenum dopant, while the doped metal proximal to the oxygen vacancies serves as Lewis basic sites to create FLPs in redox iron-based oxide. This reactivity of FLPs is further adapted to the chemical activation of molecular oxygen and aromatic sulfur-containing compounds. The Fe2O3-FLP catalyst can achieve 100 % sulfur removal at 3 h and maintains 96.9 % after seven cycles, higher than other previously reported iron-based oxidative desulfurization catalysts. In addition, the design of FLPs offers a promising approach for developing high-efficiency catalysts in the oxidative desulfurization process.