Photocatalytic Oxidation of Benzylamine by Cadmium-Based MOF Constructed with Flexible Carboxylic Acid

Graphical Cd-PLA was successfully synthesized with Cd (NO 3 ) 2 using flexible dicarboxylic acid and 4,4 ′-bipyridine as co-ligands. The bpy-containing ligand in Cd-PLA could enhance its photo-adsorption capacity. This enabled Cd-PLA presented high performance for photocatalysis of the benzylamine coupling reaction with high conversion rate and selectivity under mild conditions. This work can provide a new approach to design MOFs based on flexible ligands with photocatalytic activity. MOFs (Metal organic frameworks) have diverse structures that present great potential for light capture and light conversion. Therefore, MOFs are widely used in the study of photocatalysis. However, there still are some challenges in photocatalytic organic conversion upon MOFs under mild conditions, such as poor light absorption performance. Here, we successfully synthesized a new Cd-connected two-dimensional MOF by a simple hydrothermal method, termed [Cd(PLA)(4,4’-bipy) 0.5 ]⋅(DMF) (Cd-PLA) (PLA= phenylene-diacetic acid, 4,4’-bipy= 4,4’-bipyridine and DMF= N,N’-dimethyl formamide). The bpy-containing Cd-PLA possesses excellent light harvest ability and suitable photocatalysis energy potential, allowing it to be a remarkable photocatalyst with highly efficiency and selectivity for the photo-oxidation of benzylamine. This work provides an efficient, economical, and green way for oxidation of amines to produce imines under ultraviolet light irradiation.