Determining the TiO2-photocatalytic aryl-ring-opening mechanism in aqueous solution using oxygen-18 labeled O2 and H2O.

The molecules O2 and H2O dominate the cleavage of aromatic sp(2) C-C bonds, a crucial step in the degradation of aromatic pollutants in aqueous TiO2 photocatalysis, but their precise roles in this process have remained elusive. This can be attributed to the complex oxidative species involved and to a lack of available models for reactions with a high yield of direct products. Here, we used oxygen-18 isotope labeled O2 and H2O to observe the aromatic ring-opening reaction of the model compound 3,5-di-tert-butylcatechol (DTBC), which was mediated by TiO2 photocatalysis in an aqueous acetonitrile solution. By analyzing the primary intermediate products (∼75% yield), especially the seven-membered ring anhydrides that were formed, we obtained direct evidence for the oxygen atom of dioxygen insertion into a C-C bond of the aromatic ring. This indicates that molecular oxygen is the ultimate ring-opening agent in TiO2 photocatalysis and that it undergoes single O atom incorporation rather than the previously proposed molecular oxygen 1,2-addition processes. The ratio of intradiol to extradiol products depends on the particle size of TiO2 catalysts used, which suggests that the O2 activation is correlated with the available coordination sites on the TiO2 surface in the photocatalytic cleavage of the aromatic ring.