Ruthenium Complexation in an Aluminium Metal-Organic Framework and Its Application in Alcohol Oxidation Catalysis

A ruthenium trichloride complex has been loaded into an aluminium metalorganic framework (MOF), MOF-253, by post-synthetic modification to give MOF-253-Ru. MOF-253 contains open bipyridine sites that are available to bind with the ruthenium complex. MOF-253-Ru was characterised by elemental analysis, N2 sorption and X-ray powder diffraction. This is the first time that a Ru complex has been coordinated to a MOF through post-synthetic modification and used as a heterogeneous catalyst. MOF-253-Ru catalysed the oxidation of primary and secondary alcohols, including allylic alcohols, with PhI(OAc)2 as the oxidant under very mild reaction conditions (ambient temperature to 40 degrees C). High conversions (up to >99%) were achieved in short reaction times (13 h) by using low catalyst loadings (0.5 mol% Ru). In addition, high selectivities (>90%) for aldehydes were obtained at room temperature. MOF-253-Ru can be recycled up to six times with only a moderate decrease in substrate conversion.