A magnetic supported iron complex for selective oxidation of sulfides to sulfoxides using 30% hydrogen peroxide at room temperature

A magnetic supported iron (iron(II) acetylacetonate) was synthesized to be used as an efficient and recyclable heterogeneous catalyst for the selective oxidation of sulfides to corresponding sulfoxides using H2O2 as a green oxidant at room temperature. The synthesized Fe3O4@SiO2-APTES(Fe(acac)(2)) catalyst presented excellent sulfide conversion and good sulfoxide selectivity. It can be easily recovered and reused for 8 reaction cycles without considerable loss of activity. The facile recovery of the catalyst is carried out by applying an external magnet device. The catalyst was fully characterized by techniques of TEM, SEM, XRD, EDS, FTIR, TGA, ICP-AES, VSM and elemental analysis (CHN).