Communications Selective Oxidation of Organic Sulfides to Sulfoxides by Hydrogen Peroxide with Trirutile-Type Solid Oxide Catalyst HNbMoO6

Selective oxidation of organic sulfides to sulfoxides has been the subject of extensive research because of their importance of sulfoxides as intermediates in various organic reactions.1 One of the simplest methods for oxidation of sulfides to sulfoxides is the use of hydrogen peroxide as an oxidant in the presence of a catalyst. Though a number of catalysts including soluble metal complexes have been used for the reaction,1,2 there are a few reports employing a heterogeneous catalyst despite the advantage in separation and reuse of the catalyst.3 In this paper, we introduce a new heterogeneous catalyst, HNbMoO6, which shows an excellent catalytic activity in the oxidation of sulfides. Trirutile-type solid oxide, AMM’O6, was first synthesized in 1970.4 Since then, many applications of the solid oxide in various fields such as non-linear optics and composites hav