Highly active Cu/MgO catalysts for selective dehydrogenation of benzyl alcohol into benzaldehyde using neither O-2 nor H-2 acceptor

Aiming at developing an efficient catalyst for selective dehydrogenation of benzyl alcohol into benzaldehyde in the absence of O-2 and H-2 acceptor, a series of Cu/MgO catalysts with Cu loading of 1, 3, 5, and 7% have been prepared, of which the 5% Cu/MgO catalyst in the gas phase exhibited a remarkable performance with 98% conversion and 97% selectivity and in support of the performance, the catalysts have been characterized by different techniques like BET surface area analysis, XRD, TEM, CO2-TPD, N2O pulse chemisorption, XPS and TPR.