The Adsorption of VO(acac)2 on a Mesoporous Silica Support by Liquid Phase and Gas Phase Modification to Prepare Supported Vanadium Oxide Catalysts

Supported vanadium oxide catalysts are prepared by adsorption and subsequent calcination of the vanadyl acetylacetonate complex on silica by liquid phase and gas phase modification. The influence of the pretreatment temperature and the effect of the solvent in the liquid phase are discussed. Two types of gas phase deposition processes are used: flow-type reactions and vacuum deposition. The bonding mechanism, the influence of pretreatment temperature of the support and the influence of the reaction temperature are investigated by FTIR, XRD, TGA and chemical analysis. After calcination the obtained vanadium oxide layer is characterized by XRD and UV-Vis diffuse reflectance spectroscopy. The gas phase modification enables the creation of well dispersed supported VO_x catalysts. Loadings up to 1.4 mmol g^-1 (7 wt% V) without the formation of a crystalline fraction can be achieved. The selective oxidation of methanol to formaldehyde is used as a probe reaction to assess the catalytic activity and selectivity of the catalysts. It is shown that not the concentration of vanadium species, but their surface configuration is the determining factor in catalytic reactions.