Ruthenium nanoparticles confined in SBA-15 as highly efficient catalyst for hydrolytic dehydrogenation of ammonia borane and hydrazine borane

Ultrafine ruthenium nanoparticles (NPs) within the mesopores of the SBA-15 have been successfully prepared by using a “double solvents” method, in which n -hexane is used as a hydrophobic solvent and RuCl 3 aqueous solution is used as a hydrophilic solvent. After the impregnation and reduction processes, the samples were characterized by XRD, TEM, EDX, XPS, N 2 adsorption-desorption and ICP techniques. The TEM images show that small sized Ru NPs with an average size of 3.0 ± 0.8 nm are uniformly dispersed in the mesopores of SBA-15. The as-synthesized Ru@SBA-15 nanocomposites (NCs) display exceptional catalytic activity for hydrogen generation by the hydrolysis of ammonia borane (NH 3 BH 3 , AB) and hydrazine borane (N 2 H 4 BH 3 , HB) at room temperature with the turnover frequency (TOF) value of 316 and 706 mol H 2 (mol Ru min) −1 , respectively, relatively high values reported so far for the same reaction. The activation energies ( E a ) for the hydrolysis of AB and HB catalyzed by Ru@SBA-15 NCs are measured to be 34.8 ± 2 and 41.3 ± 2 kJ mol −1 , respectively. Moreover, Ru@SBA-15 NCs also show satisfied durable stability for the hydrolytic dehydrogenation of AB and HB, respectively.