Synthesis of Mesoporous Silica-Supported NiCo Bimetallic Nanocatalysts and Their Enhanced Catalytic Hydrogenation Performance

In this work, mesoporous silica SBA-16-supported NiCo bimetallic nanocatalysts were synthesized by coimpregnation of Ni and Co precursors followed by calcination and reduction, and various characterization techniques confirm the formation of NiCo bimetallic nanostructures in the catalysts. The synthesized NiCo/SBA-16 shows enhanced catalytic performance for hydrogenation of a series of nitroaromatics. Under the reaction conditions of 80 °C and 1.0 MPa of H2, the yields of aniline for nitrobenzene hydrogenation over NiCo0.3/SBA-16 can reach more than 99% at 2.0 h. The enhanced catalytic performance can be ascribed to the formation of NiCo bimetallic nanostructures, where the synergistic effect between Ni and Co improves their catalytic activities for hydrogenation of nitroaromatics