An amide/iminium zwitterion catalyst has a catalyst pocket size that promotes transesterification and dehydrative esterification. The amide/iminium zwitterions are easily prepared by reacting aziridines with aminopyridines. The reaction can be applied a wide variety of esterification processes including the large-scale synthesis of biodiesel. The amide/iminium zwitterions allow the avoidance of strongly basic or acidic condition and avoidance of metal contamination in the products. Reactions are carried out at ambient or only modestly elevated temperatures. The amide/iminium zwitterion catalyst is easily recycled and reactions proceed in high to quantitative yields.

Described are methods for preparing a deuterated aldehyde using N-heterocyclic carbene catalysts in a solvent comprising D.sub.2O. The methods may be used to convert a wide variety of aldehydes (e.g., aryl, alkyl, or alkenyl aldehydes) to C-1 deuterated aldehydes under mild reaction conditions without functionality manipulation.

Disclosed are a preparation method and application of a 4-methyl-5-vinylthiazolyl polymerized spherical ionic liquid catalyst. The method comprises: preparing a functional ionic liquid monomer successfully by taking 4-methyl-5-vinylthiazole as the matrix, and preparing the polymerized spherical ionic liquid from the monomer. The catalyst combines the advantages of both ionic liquid and the polymer, and has the characteristics of large specific surface area, high catalytic activity, high mass transfer rate, good selectivity, high stability, easy recycling and separating, environmental friendliness, wide industrial application prospect, etc. The spherical ionic liquid is made into a novel catalytic packing and then put into a reactive distillation column for continuous reactive distillation of esterification and transesterification to realize the organic combination of the ionic liquid and the reactive distillation technology, achieving good catalytic activity, high product yield, environmental friendliness, and low corrosivity, which has great significance in realizing an environment-friendly process.

A method of producing a catalytic carbon fiber may include: oxidizing a virgin carbon fiber to produce an oxidized carbon fiber; reacting the oxidized carbon fiber with a polyamine compound to produce an amine modified carbon fiber; and reacting the amine modified carbon fiber with an organometallic macrocycle to produce the catalytic carbon fiber.

A photothermal catalytic method for production of hydrogen peroxide without a sacrificial reagent on the basis of a porphyrin-based supermolecule is provided. The method includes the following steps: uniformly mixing a porphyrin-based supermolecule photocatalyst with a concentration of 0.3-1.5 g/L with ultrapure water, conducting irradiation with a visible light for a period of time under stirring at a temperature of 40-80° C. and an O.sub.2 flow rate of 50-150 mL/min, and then filtering and concentrating a reaction liquid to obtain an aqueous hydrogen peroxide solution with a high concentration. According to the new photothermal catalytic method for preparing the hydrogen peroxide provided in the present disclosure, no organic solvent (such as ethanol, isopropanol and benzyl alcohol) is used as a sacrificial reagent, and the method is environmentally friendly and free of pollution. O.sub.2 is used as an oxygen source, sunlight is used as an energy source, and the method is low in energy consumption and high in safety (compared with an industrial anthraquinone method for synthesizing hydrogen peroxide). The method is simple in operation, mild in reaction conditions and high in production of the hydrogen peroxide.

Methods of carbohydrate acetylation are disclosed. A method may include adding a carbohydrate to a reaction vessel, adding poly-4-vinylpyriding (P4VP) to the reaction vessel, adding a bio-derived solvent to the reaction vessel, adding acetic anhydride (Ac20) to the reaction vessel, and adding a catalyst to the reaction vessel. The bio-derived solvent may be 2-methyltetrahydrofuran (2-MeTHF). A catalyst may also be added to the reaction vessel.

The present invention provides a catalyst containing a Brønsted acid as a novel means capable of producing an amide compound by highly stereoselectively and/or highly efficiently causing an amidation reaction in a variety of substrates having a carboxylic ester group and an amino group.

The present invention relates to a composition, comprising a palladium compound which is a palladium salt or a palladium complex or a mixture thereof, and a polycyclic compound of Formula (I), (II) or (III):

An activated carbon-based media for efficient removal of chloramines as well as chlorine and ammonia from an aqueous stream is presented, and a method for making the same. The method involves preparing activated carbon that remove chloramines efficiently from chloramine-rich aqueous media. In particular, this application relates to the use of high performance catalytically active carbon for an efficient removal of chloramine from drinking water in the form of a solid carbon block or granular carbon media. The activated carbon is treated with a nitrogen-rich compound, such as, melamine.

This disclosure describes enantiomerically enriched chiral molecular sieves and methods of making and using the same. In some embodiments, the molecular sieves are silicates or germanosilicates of STW topology.