Alumina supported nanoruthenium as efficient heterogeneous catalyst for the selective H2O2 oxidation of aliphatic and aromatic sulfides to sulfoxides

Highly stable polyvinylpyrrolidone (PVP) capped ruthenium nanoparticles (RuNPs) supported on gamma-Al2O3 in CH3CN serve as efficient heterogeneous catalysts for the H2O2 oxidation of sulfides into the corresponding sulfoxides in excellent yields. The synthesized catalyst 1 is well characterized by XRD, HRTEM, BET, H-2 chemisorption, SEM-EDX, AFM, FT-IR, and UV-vis spectral techniques. The catalyst 1 can be recovered and reused for several cycles without loss of any activity. (C) 2010 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.