Urchin-like CoCu Bimetallic Nanocomposites for Catalytic Hydrogenolysis of Glycerol to Propanediols

Bimetallic CoCu nanocomposites were synthesized in polyol by using Ru as heterogeneous nucleation agent and stearic acid as surfactant, and their catalytic properties were investi- gated by hydrogenolysis of glycerol to propanediols. It was found that the surfactant could induce Co nanocrystals to form nanowires as structure-directing agent, while it's ineffective for Cu because only spherical Cu particles were produced under the same condition. When Co²⁺ and Cu²⁺ coexist in polyol, Cu²⁺ is firstly reduced and forms the spherical particles, and then the Cu particles afford surface for the subsequential reduction of Co²⁺ and growth of Co nanocrystals to form the nanorods, obtaining the urchin-like CoCu nanocomposites. The catalytic performance in selective hydrogenolysis of glycerol to propanediols proposed that the CoCu urchin-like nanocomposites was superior to the Co nanowires possibly due to that the synergistic effect between Co and Cu component promoted conversion of glyc-erol and obtained the higher propanediol yields based on the specific surface areas of the catalysts.