Catalytic decomposition of ammonium perchlorate on hollow mesoporous CuO microspheres

Hollow mesoporous CuO microspheres (CuO-HM) have been prepared by a hard-template method and their structure properties as well as catalytic performance in ammonium perchlorate (AP) decomposition were fully investigated by XRD, SEM, XPS, TG/DSC and TG/F-TIR methods. The results indicated that CuO-HM could be described as CuO micro-sized spheres composed of self-assembled nanoparticles, possessing hollow and mesoporous structure. Compared with CuO nanoparticles and CuO microspheres, CuO-HM has significantly improved catalytic efficiency in AP decomposition due to large surface area, easily accessible porous and hollow structure. Typically, CuO-HM could decrease the AP decomposition temperature by 105.7 °C and enhance the heat production by 735 J/g. TG/FT-IR results indicated that CuO-HM accelerated the thermal decomposition of AP mainly at the high temperature decomposition stage with the releasing of N₂O, NO, NH₃, H₂O, HCl, O₂ et al. This study demonstrated that hollow and mesoporous CuO was a promising catalyst for the application in solid fuel rockets propellants.