Different NaY molecular sieves, including NaY, HY, USY and Ce-USY, were prepared by in situ hydrothermal process, ion exchange and/or hydrothermal treatment. The effects of isologous Y molecular sieves on p-aminophenol preparation from phenyl-hydroxylamine rearrangement were studied. XRD, N₂ adsorptiondesorption and Py-FTIR results showed that although the molecular sieves had differences in crystallinity, they all had the skeleton topology of Y type molecular sieves. The micropore size of HY molecular sieve was about 0.58 nm. NaY molecular sieve had almost no B acid site. For three kinds of other molecular sieves, B acid content ranked in the descending sequence: HY>USY≈Ce-USY, and L acid content ranked in the descending sequence: USY≈Ce-USY>HY. The performance of their catalysts showed that Y-type molecular sieve had the inferior performance, the selectivity and yield of p-aminophenol of target product were less than 15%. So the p-aminophenol product with high yield and purity could be prepared from the smallest amount of reactant only when molecular sieve maintained an appropriate amount of acidity and pore size.

Na-ZSM-5 was prepared by in-situ hydrothermal process. H-ZSM-5 (n(Si)/n(Al)=40) molecular sieves were prepared by ion exchange. p-Aminophenol was prepared by Bamberger rearrangement catalyzed by the molecular sieves using phenyl-hydroxylamine as raw material. XRD, FT-IR, N₂ adsorption-desorption, SEM and Py-FTIR techniques were used to study the topological structure, micropore pore size and acidity of Na-ZSM-5 and H-ZSM-5 molecular sieves. The results showed that the prepared molecular sieves had MFI microporous structures with well crystallinity. Py-FTIR technique showed that Na-ZSM-5 had almost no B acid. H-ZSM-5(40) molecular sieve had weaker B acid and L acid. Catalysis performance showed that phenyl-hydroxylamine conversion was low in the presence of ZSM-5 with weaker acidity as catalyst. However, because of its moderate pore size, p-aminophenol selectivity and yield reached as high as 72.48% and 58.75%, respectively. The optimal conditions of p-aminophenol preparation from phenyl-hydroxylamine Bamberger rearrangement were as follows: mass ratio 1∶3 of phenyl-hydroxylamine to H-ZSM-5(40) molecular sieve, optimal reaction temperature of 353 K, optimal reaction time of 2 h, and water as solvent. Phenyl-hydroxylamine conversion and p-aminophenol selectivity were as high as 86.35% and 78.33%, respectively.