Preparing acid-resistant Ru-based catalysts by carbothermal reduction for hydrogenation of itaconic acid

Catalytic conversion and application of bio-based platform chemicals is of great significance. Itaconic acid, one of the abundant and renewable bio-based platform chemicals, could be hydrogenated to produce methylsuccinic acid, which has important applications in pharmaceutical synthesis. Traditional catalysts can be corroded, leached and deactivated in an acid reaction environment, and the stability of the catalysts is a great challenge. Carbothermal reduction was employed to prepare stable ruthenium-based catalysts, and the results confirmed that CO generated in situ functioned as an efficient reducing species in the carbothermal reduction process. The catalysts were applied for the hydrogenation of itaconic acid, and showed good stability and resistance to acid with no obvious loss of activity and less leaching in recycling tests compared to hydrogen reduced samples which exhibited an apparent decrease of 22% for the conversion of itaconic acid. The carbothermal reduced catalysts could maintain 99% conversion and 99% selectivity for methylsuccinic acid, and maintained good stability and acid-resistance under a higher temperature and longer reaction time.