Synthesis and Characteristics of CaO/MgO Mixed Oxides for the Double Bond Isomerization of 1-Butene.

The MgO catalysts containing only weak/medium basic sites were doped with a strong basic oxide CaO by co-precipitation method with 0.19-3.64 wt% CaO. While the amount of strong basic sites linearly increased with wt.% CaO, the activity for isomerization of 1-butene to 2-butenes of the CaO-doped MgO catalysts was maximized at 1.77 wt% CaO. Addition of a small amount of CaO-dopant altered the MgO structure (i.e., the formation of step, edge, and corner sites), resulting in different OH- adsorption abilities and enhanced catalytic activities.