NiFe Oxides as Anodic Materials for the Electrocatalytic Oxidation of Glucose to Glucaric Acid

A new frontier for the chemical industry is the highly selective transformation, by electrochemistry, of raw materials from biomass into intermediates. Demonstrating its feasibility is one of the objectives of the EU PERFORM project, focusing on specific investigations regarding targeted paired reactions such as glucose electro-oxidation to glucaric acid, a first step in the adipic acid electrochemical synthesis. Here we report, the preparation of nanostructured NiFe oxide catalysts (NiFeOx/NF), synthesized from Ni foam, via LDH intermediates, as efficient catalysts for glucose electrochemical oxidation. NiFeOx/NF have been characterized by SEM and XPS. The materials were tested for D-glucose oxidation in a three-electrode set-up cell, by using a PGSTAT30 equipped with a Pt wire as the counter, a saturated Ag/AgCl electrode as the reference, and the NiFeOx/NF as the working electrode. The tests were performed by LSV and CV at rt, in Ar purged 1 M KOH. According to preliminary tests, electro-oxidation of glucose occurs at a lower potential than the OER, the main undesired side reaction (Figure 1). Further analyses are ongoing for evaluating glucose conversion and selectivity toward glucaric acid under different potentials and glucose concentrations. The approach is inspired to green chemistry, allowing both energy saving and biomass valorisation.