A chemo-enzymatic oxidation cascade to activate C-H bonds with in situ generated H<sub>2</sub>O<sub>2</sub>.

Freakley, Simon J; Kochius, Svenja; van Marwijk, Jacqueline; Fenner, Caryn; Lewis, Richard J; Baldenius, Kai; Marais, Sarel S; Opperman, Diederik J et al. · Nat Commun · 2019

basic_science · Level V

Where this comes from

Abstract

Continuous low-level supply or in situ generation of hydrogen peroxide (H<sub>2</sub>O<sub>2</sub>) is essential for the stability of unspecific peroxygenases, which are deemed ideal biocatalysts for the selective activation of C-H bonds. To envisage potential large scale applications of combined catalytic systems the reactions need to be simple, efficient and produce minimal by-products. We show that gold-palladium nanoparticles supported on TiO<sub>2</sub> or carbon have sufficient activity at ambient temperature and pressure to generate H<sub>2</sub>O<sub>2</sub> from H<sub>2</sub> and O<sub>2</sub> and supply the oxidant to the engineered unspecific heme-thiolate peroxygenase PaDa-I. This tandem catalyst combination facilitates efficient oxidation of a range of C-H bonds to hydroxylated products in one reaction vessel with only water as a by-product under conditions that could be easily scaled.