Journal article

Biogenic production of palladium nanocrystals using microalgae and their immobilization on chitosan nanofibers for catalytic applications

E Eroglu, X Chen, M Bradshaw, V Agarwal, J Zou, SG Stewart, X Duan, RN Lamb, SM Smith, CL Raston, KS Iyer

Rsc Advances | Published : 2013

Abstract

Spherical palladium nanocrystals were generated from aqueous Na 2[PdCl4] via photosynthetic reactions within green microalgae (Chlorella vulgaris). Electrospun chitosan mats were effective for immobilizing these biogenic nanocrystals, as a material for recycling as a catalyst for the Mizoroki-Heck cross-coupling reaction. This photosynthetically-driven metal transformation system can serve as a good candidate for an environmentally-friendly method for the synthesis of metal nanocatalysts. © The Royal Society of Chemistry 2013.

University of Melbourne Researchers

Grants

Funding Acknowledgements

We kindly acknowledge support of this work by the Australian Research Council (ARC) and internal grants of The University of Western Australia. The microscopy analysis was carried out using the facilities in the Centre for Microscopy, Characterization and Analysis (The University of Western Australia). The authors also would like to thank Dr L. Byrne for his kind help during the NMR analysis.