Photocatalytic Oxidative Dehydrogenation of Propane for Selective Propene Production with TiO(2)

[Image: see text] Oxidative dehydrogenation of propane (ODHP) as an exothermic process is a promising method to produce propene (C(3)H(6)) with lower energy consumption in chemical industry. However, the selectivity of the C(3)H(6) product is always poor because of overoxidation. Herein, the ODHP reaction into C(3)H(6) on a model rutile(R)-TiO(2)(110) surface at low temperature via photocatalysis has been realized successfully. The results illustrate that photocatalytic oxidative dehydrogenation of propane (C(3)H(8)) into C(3)H(6) can occur efficiently on R-TiO(2)(110) at 90 K via a stepwise manner, in which the initial C–H cleavage occurs via the hole coupled C–H bond cleavage pathway followed by a radical mediated C–H cleavage to the C(3)H(6) product. An exceptional selectivity of ∼90% for C(3)H(6) production is achieved at about 13% propane conversion. The mechanistic model constructed in this study not only advances our understanding of C–H bond activation but also provides a new pathway for highly selective ODHP into C(3)H(6) under mild conditions.