High turnover in electro-oxidation of alcohols and ethers with a glassy carbon-supported phenanthroimidazole mediator† †Electronic supplementary information (ESI) available. See DOI: 10.1039/c7sc02482g Click here for additional data file.

Glassy carbon electrodes covalently modified with a phenanthroimidazole mediator promote electrochemical alcohol and ether oxidation: three orders of magnitude increase in TON, to 15 000 in each case, was observed compared with homogeneous mediated reactions. We propose the deactivation pathways in homogeneous solution are prevented by the immobilization: modified electrode reversibility is increased for a one-electron oxidation reaction. The modified electrodes were used to catalytically oxidize p-anisyl alcohol and 1-((benzyloxy)methyl)-4-methoxybenzene, selectively, to the corresponding benzaldehyde and benzyl ester, respectively.