Facile construction of new coronal-like MnCeOx hollow nanosphere for efficiently removing o-dichlorobenzene

Designing unique and ingenious microstructure or morphology of catalysts is critical and still a challenge to obtain high catalytic performance in catalytic combustion reactions under dry air and 5.0 vol% H2O conditions, especially by economic and efficient measures. In pursuit of this goal, a facile strategy was exploited to accurately construct new-coronal like MnCeOx hollow microsphere with different Ce contents. This unique structure can expose more active sites and has excellent redox ability. The simulation results of generalized gradient approximation (GGA) of density functional theory (DFT) indicated that the introduction of a certain amount of Ce can effectively improve the adsorption and activation of o-DCB molecules on Mn3O4. The detailed study showed that the Mn2Ce1Ox hollow nanosphere exhibited excellent catalytic performance in the presence of 5.0 vol% H2O. Ideally, the action of Marse-van Krevelen (Mvk) combine Langmuir-Hinshelwood (L-H) mechanism was deduced based on the origin of oxygen species under dry air conditions. In general, the green and facile synthetic strategy provides a new idea for the design of hollow microsphere Mn-based catalyst and the unique structure significantly improves the comprehensive performance of o-DCB catalytic oxidation, which brings great hope for industrial application. [Display omitted] •The new coronal-like catalyst with a hollow structure was successfully prepared by simple, ingenious and green strategy.•The interaction between active centers (Mn-Ce) improves the catalytic performance of the catalyst.•The introduction of Ce atom improved the adsorption capacity of the catalyst for o-DCB proved by DFT.•MvK and L-H reaction mechanisms was prominent on Mn2Ce1Ox.