The effect of Ag (1 wt%) and Au (1 wt%) on the catalytic properties of Ni/Al 2 O 3 (7 wt% Ni) for methane steam reforming (MSR) was studied in parallel with the effect of CeO 2 (6 wt%) and La 2 O 3 (6 wt%) addition. The addition of 1 wt% Ag to the alumina supported nickel catalyst drastically decreased its catalytic properties at temperatures lower than 600°C, due to the blockage of metal catalytic centers by silver deposition. The addition of Au and CeO 2 (La 2 O 3 ) to the nickel catalyst improved the methane conversion, CO 2 selectivity and hydrogen production at low reaction temperatures (t \ 600°C). At 700°C under our working conditions, the additives have no important effect in hydrogen production by MSR. The best hydrogen production at low temperatures was obtained for Ni-Au/Al 2 O 3 , due to the higher CO 2 selectivity, cumulated with slightly higher methane conversion in comparison with Ni/CeO 2 -Al 2 O 3 . At high temperature, Ni/CeO 2 -Al 2 O 3 is stable for 48 h on stream. are mainly deactivated due to the temperature effect on Au and Ag nanoparticles and less through coke formation. On , crystalline, graphitic carbon was deposited after 48 h of reaction leading to catalyst partial deactivation. On the Ni/CeO 2 -Al 2 O 3 surface, a porous amorphous form of deposited carbon was found, which does not decrease its catalytic activity after 48 h of reaction.Electronic supplementary material The online version of this article (

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High catalytic activity and selectivity has been demonstrated for the oxidation of both aliphatic and aromatic amines to nitriles under benign conditions with dioxygen or air using the Ru 2 Cl 4 (az-tpy) 2 complex. The conversion was found to be strongly influenced by the alkyl chain length of the reactant with shorter chain amines found to have lower conversions than those with longer chains. Importantly, by using the ruthenium terpyridine complex functionalized with azulenyl moiety at the 4 position of central pyridine core provided a much higher reactivity catalyst compared with a series of ruthenium terpyridine-based ligand complexes reported. Mechanistic studies using deuterated benzylamine demonstrated the importance of RuOH in this reaction.

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