Preparation and catalytic performance of active metal sintered membrane reactor anchored with Pt atoms

In the chemical industry, reactors are typically designed and filled with supported catalyst particles. However, the intrinsic problems associated with the internal/external diffusion effect and catalyst separation/loss in these traditional reactors can be very challenging to mitigate. To address these issues, herein, an active metal sintered membrane reactor anchored with Pt atoms was successfully developed, and applied into continuous, liquid-phase, hydrogenation processes. The catalyzing reactions transpired on the active sites that were fastened onto the surface of the reactor's microchannels. As a result, the mass transfer at the gas–liquid–solid three-phase was greatly enhanced, and an incredibly high reaction efficiency was obtained. The novel, active reactor demonstrated a superior catalytic performance and stability to nitrobenzene (NB) hydrogenation at 120 °C and 0.5 MPa H2, which enabled an aniline (ANI) yield of 19.28 molANI h−1 L−1. This work opens a new window for the design of high-performance gas–liquid–solid reactor toward multiphase catalytic reactions.