New chiral catalytic membrane reactor created by immobilizing salen-Mn(III) onto APTES modified ceramic membrane and its performances in epoxidation of styrene

• Chiral catalytic membrane reactor has been constructed for epoxidation of styrene.
• The reactor exhibited comparable catalytic performance to the homogeneous counterpart.
• This reactor can reuse the catalyst directly without any separation stage.

New chiral catalytic ceramic membrane (CCCM) reactor was constructed by immobilizing mono-CH2Cl-salen-Mn(III) catalysts onto 3-aminopropyltriethoxysilane modified ceramic ultrafiltration membranes through chemical bonding. The performance of CCCM reactor was investigated by catalyzing the asymmetric epoxidation of styrene and was comparable to the homogeneous salen-Mn(III) catalyst under the same reaction conditions. Furthermore, the obtained reactor showed relatively stable catalytic performances in four runs of epoxidation reaction. And in this reactor, the catalyst can be reused directly without any separation stage.

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