Over the past decade, a great deal of effort has been devoted to developing reductive processes in the field of biomass valorisation for the sustainable production of bio-fuel additives and chemicals. Catalytic transfer hydrogenation, which uses alcohol as the hydrogen source, is an interesting approach that avoids the use of both high H₂ pressure and precious metal catalysts. In this work, the vapour-phase production of 2-methylfuran from biomass-derived furfural (FU), using methanol as the H-transfer agent and FeVO₄ catalyst, was studied. At a temperature of 320 °C it was possible to achieve 80% yield of 2-methylfuran, with small amounts of 2,5-dimethylfuran and 2-vinylfuran as by-products. Catalyst characterization highlighted that FeVO₄ reduction took place under the studied conditions, leading to the in situ development of a true active phase. The study of the reaction network permitted us to infer on the relative contribution of H-transfer and hydrogenation, the latter from the in situ generated formaldehyde and H₂, to 2-methylfuran, formation. The reported results indicate the potential application of H-transfer with FeVO₄ catalysts as an efficient process for the selective de-oxygenation of biomass-derived molecules.

中文翻译：

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利用氢转移作为催化还原生物基构件的工具：使用FeVO ₄催化剂气相生产2-甲基糠醛

在过去的十年中，在生物质增值领域中致力于开发还原工艺以可持续生产生物燃料添加剂和化学品的工作量很大。使用醇作为氢源的催化转移氢化是一种避免同时使用高H ₂压力和贵金属催化剂的有趣方法。在这项工作中，研究了使用甲醇作为H-转移剂和FeVO ₄催化剂，从生物质衍生的糠醛（FU）汽相生产2-甲基呋喃的方法。在320°C的温度下，有可能获得80％的2-甲基呋喃，副产物有少量的2,5-二甲基呋喃和2-乙烯基呋喃。催化剂表征突出表明FeVO ₄在所研究的条件下发生还原反应，从而导致真正的活性相原位形成。反应网络的研究使我们可以推断出H转移和氢化的相对作用，后者是从原位生成的甲醛和H ₂到2-甲基呋喃的形成。报告的结果表明，利用FeVO ₄催化剂进行H转移作为生物质衍生分子的选择性脱氧的有效方法的潜在应用。