Ceria and Modified Ceria: A Reusable Catalyst for the Green Synthesis of 2,3-diphenyl Quinoxaline at Room Temperature

Abstract

Simple, highly versatile and efficient synthesis of 2,3-diphenylquinoxalines is achieved from benzil and o-phenylene diamine  using ceria and modified ceria as the catalyst. Modification of ceria is done using different weight percentage of zirconia. The catalysts are characterized by XRD, FT-IR, BET surface area, TGA and EDX-SEM. The advantages of this method are short reaction times, milder conditions and easy work-up. The product could be separated from the heterogeneous catalyst by simple filtration and the catalyst could be recycled and reused several times without noticeably decreasing the catalytic activity. The product was characterized by physical constants, FT-IR and
 ¹HNMR analysis