Nitro-Decorated Microporous Covalent Organic Framework (TpPa-NO2) for Selective Separation of C2H4 from a C2H2/C2H4/CO2 Mixture and CO2 Capture

1,3,5-Triformylphloroglucinol Derived β-Ketoenamine-Linked Functional Covalent Organic Frameworks with Enhanced Crystallinity and Stability-Recent Advances

Crystallinity, stability, and complexity are significant factors to consider in the design and development of covalent organic frameworks (COFs). Among various building blocks used, 1,3,5-triformylphloroglucinol (Tp) is notable for enhancing both crystallinity and structural stability in COFs. Tp facilitates the formation of β-ketoenamine-linked COFs through keto-enol tautomerism when reacted with aromatic amines. This review article examines the stability, crystallinity, and flexibility of synthetic methodologies involving Tp-based COFs, while highlighting their recent applications. We emphasize the critical roles of non-covalent interactions and keto-enol tautomerism in achieving high levels of crystallinity and stability. Additionally, the diverse and straightforward synthesis methods available for Tp-based COFs contribute to the prevalence of 1,3,5-triformylphloroglucinol in COF development. We conclude by addressing the challenges and future prospects in this area, underscoring the significant potential of Tp-based COFs for environmental and energy-related applications due to their exceptional structural tunability and functionality.

COFs as porous organic materials for the separation and purification of ethylene from C2 hydrocarbons

With rapid societal development, there has been a significant increase in the demand for chemicals. Ethylene, as the most widely used basic chemical, is now subject to increasingly stringent quality and purity standards. The separation and purification of ethylene from C2 hydrocarbons via covalent organic frameworks (COFs) are a fascinating and challenging area of research. Compared with conventional separation techniques, COFs have demonstrated the capacity to efficiently separate and purify analogues while simultaneously reducing energy consumption. As a result, it is urgent to conduct a study on COF applications in separating and purifying ethylene from C2 hydrocarbons to foster greater advancement in this field. This review provides an overview of research on ethylene separation, discusses the results and effective strategies reported for the use of COFs in ethylene separation to date, and presents challenges encountered in the current development process. The aim of this review is to inspire the design of COFs for ethylene separation and facilitate further development in this emerging field.

Rational Conversion of Imine Linkages to Amide Linkages in Covalent Organic Frameworks for Photocatalytic Oxidation with Enhanced Photostability

Covalent organic frameworks (COFs) and their applications in photocatalysis have been extensively studied, but the instability of imine-linked COFs is an important factor limiting their performance. In this work, two imine-linked COFs were successfully converted to amide-linked COFs through post synthetic modification (PSM). The oxidized COFs presented lower binding energy to O2, exhibited higher photocatalytic activity for oxidation of thioethers and coupling of benzylamines with excellent stability. The present work can serve as a reliable reference for the development of novel highly active and stable COF-based photocatalysts.

Single-Molecule Traps in Covalent Organic Frameworks for Selective Capture of C2H2 from C2H4-Rich Gas Mixtures

Removing trace amounts of acetylene (C2H2) from ethylene (C2H4)-rich gas mixtures is vital for the supply of high-purity C2H4 to the chemical industry and plastics sector. However, selective removal of C2H2 is challenging due to the similar physical and chemical properties of C2H2 and C2H4. Here, we report a "single-molecule trap" strategy that utilizes electrostatic interactions between the one-dimensional (1D) channel of a covalent organic framework (denoted as COF-1) and C2H2 molecules to massively enhance the adsorption selectivity toward C2H2 over C2H4. C2H2 molecules are immobilized via interactions with the O atom of C=O groups, the N atom of C≡N groups, and the H atom of phenyl groups in 1D channels of COF-1. Due to its exceptionally high affinity for C2H2, COF-1 delivered a remarkable C2H2 uptake of 7.97 cm3/g at 298 K and 0.01 bar, surpassing all reported COFs and many other state-of-the-art adsorbents under similar conditions. Further, COF-1 demonstrated outstanding performance for the separation of C2H2 and C2H4 in breakthrough experiments under dynamic conditions. COF-1 adsorbed C2H2 at a capacity of 0.17 cm3/g at 2,000 s/g when exposed to 0.5 ml/min C2H4-rich gas mixture (99% C2H4) at 298 K, directly producing high-purity C2H4 gas at a rate of 3.95 cm3/g. Computational simulations showed that the strong affinity between C2H2 and the single-molecule traps of COF-1 were responsible for the excellent separation performance. COF-1 is also robust, providing a promising new strategy for the efficient removal of trace amounts of C2H2 in practical C2H4 purification.

Covalent Organic Frameworks: Cutting-Edge Materials for Carbon Dioxide Capture and Water Harvesting from Air

The implacable rise of carbon dioxide (CO2 ) concentration in the atmosphere and acute water stress are one of the central challenges of our time. Present-day chemistry is strongly inclined towards more sustainable solutions. Covalent organic frameworks (COFs), attributable to their structural designability with atomic precision, functionalizable chemical environment and robust extended architectures, have demonstrated promising performances in CO2 trapping and water harvesting from air. In this Review, we discuss the major developments in this field as well as sketch out the opportunities and shortcomings that remain over large-scale COF synthesis, device engineering, and long-term performance in real environments.

Construction of a conjugated covalent organic framework for iodine capture

Radioactive iodine in the nuclear field is considered very dangerous nuclear waste because of its chemical toxicity, high mobility and long radioactive half-life. Herein, a conjugated two-dimensional covalent organic framework, TPB-TMPD-COF, has been designed and synthesized for iodine capture. TPB-TMPD-COF has been well characterized by several techniques and showed long order structure and a large surface area (1090 m2 g-1). Moreover, TPB-TMPD-COF shows a high iodine capture value at 4.75 g g-1 under 350 K and normal pressure conditions, benefitting from the increased density of adsorption sites. By using multiple techniques, the iodine vapor adsorbed into the pores may readily generate the electron transfer species (I3- and I5-) due to the strong interactions between imine groups and iodine molecules, which contributes to the high iodine uptake for TPB-TMPD-COF. Our study will stimulate the design and synthesis of COFs as a solid-phase adsorbent for iodine uptake.

Electrocatalytic CO2 Reduction to Ethylene: From Advanced Catalyst Design to Industrial Applications

The value-added chemicals, monoxide, methane, ethylene, ethanol, ethane, and so on, can be efficiently generated through the electrochemical CO2 reduction reaction (eCO2 RR) when equipped with suitable catalysts. Among them, ethylene is particularly important as a chemical feedstock for petrochemical manufacture. However, despite its high Faradaic efficiency achievable at relatively low current densities, the substantial enhancement of ethylene selectivity and stability at industrial current densities poses a formidable challenge. To facilitate the industrial implementation of eCO2 RR for ethylene production, it is imperative to identify key strategies and potential solutions through comprehending the recent advancements, remaining challenges, and future directions. Herein, the latest and innovative catalyst design strategies of eCO2 RR to ethylene are summarized and discussed, starting with the properties of catalysts such as morphology, crystalline, oxidation state, defect, composition, and surface engineering. The review subsequently outlines the related important state-of-the-art technologies that are essential in driving forward eCO2 RR to ethylene into practical applications, such as CO2 capture, product separation, and downstream reactions. Finally, a greenhouse model that integrates CO2 capture, conversion, storage, and utilization is proposed to present an ideal perspective direction of eCO2 RR to ethylene.

Enhancing the Iodine Adsorption Capacity of Pyrene-Based Covalent Organic Frameworks by Regulating the Pore Environment

Regulating of pore environment is an efficient way to improve the performance of covalent organic frameworks (COFs) for specific application requirements. Herein, the design and synthesis of two pyrene-based 2D COFs with -H or -Me substituents, TFFPy-PPD-COF and TFFPy-TMPD-COF are reported. Both of them show long order structure and high porosity, in which TFFPy-PPD-COF displays a larger pore volume and bigger BET surface area (2587 m2 g-1 , 1.17 cm3 g-1 ). Interestingly, TFPPy-TMPD-COF exhibits a much higher vapor iodine capacity (4.8 g g-1 ) than TFPPy-PPD-COF (2.9 g g-1 ), in contrast to their pore volume size. By using multiple techniques, the better performance of TFPPy-TMPD-COF in iodine capture is ascribed to the altered pore environment by introducing methyl groups, which contributes to the formation of polyiodide anions and enhances the interactions between the frameworks and iodine. These results will be helpful for understanding the effect of pore environment in COFs for iodine uptake and constructing novel structure with high iodine capture performance.

Covalent organic frameworks for CO2 capture: from laboratory curiosity to industry implementation

CO2 concentration in the atmosphere has increased by about 40% since the 1960s. Among various technologies available for carbon capture, adsorption and membrane processes have been receiving tremendous attention due to their potential to capture CO2 at low costs. The kernel for such processes is the sorbent and membrane materials, and tremendous progress has been made in designing and fabricating novel porous materials for carbon capture. Covalent organic frameworks (COFs), a class of porous crystalline materials, are promising sorbents for CO2 capture due to their high surface area, low density, controllable pore size and structure, and preferable stabilities. However, the absence of synergistic developments between materials and engineering processes hinders achieving the qualitative leap for net-zero emissions. Considering the lack of a timely review on the combination of state-of-the-art COFs and engineering processes, in this Tutorial Review, we emphasize the developments of COFs for meeting the challenges of carbon capture and disclose the strategies of fabricating COFs for realizing industrial implementation. Moreover, this review presents a detailed and basic description of the engineering processes and industrial status of carbon capture. It highlights the importance of machine learning in integrating simulations of molecular and engineering levels. We aim to stimulate both academia and industry communities for joined efforts in bringing COFs to practical carbon capture.

Deep removal of trace C2H2 and CO2 from C2H4 by using customized potassium-exchange mordenite

Adsorptive separation using porous materials is a promising approach for separating alkynes/olefins due to its energy efficiency, while the deep removal of trace amounts of C2H2 and CO2 from C2H4 is still very challenging for a commercial adsorbent. Herein, we report a low-cost inorganic metal cation-mediated mordenite (MOR) zeolite with the specific location and distribution of K+ cations acting as a goalkeeper for accurately controlling diffusion channels, as evidence of the experimental and simulation results. Deep purification of C2H4 from ternary CO2/C2H2/C2H4 mixtures was first realized on K-MOR with exceptional results, achieving a remarkable polymer-grade C2H4 productivity of 1742 L kg-1 for the CO2/C2H2/C2H4 mixture. Our approach which only involves adjusting the equilibrium ions, is both promising and cost-effective, and opens up new possibilities for the use of zeolites in the industrial light hydrocarbon adsorption and purification process.

A Bipyridyl Covalent Organic Framework with Coordinated Cu(I) for Membrane C3 H6 /C3 H8 Separation

Covalent organic frameworks (COFs) mixed matrix membranes (MMMs) combining individual attributes of COFs and polymers are promising for gas separation. However, applying COF MMMs for propylene/propane (C₃ H₆ /C₃ H₈ ) separation remains a big challenge due to COF inert pores and C₃ H₆ /C₃ H₈ similar molecular sizes. Herein, the designed synthesis of a Cu(I) coordinated COF for membrane C₃ H₆ /C₃ H₈ separation is reported. A platform COF is synthesized from 5,5'-diamino-2,2'-bipyridine and 2-hydroxybenzene-1,3,5-tricarbaldehyde. This COF possesses a porous 2D structure with high crystallinity. Cu(I) is coordinated to bipyridyl moieties in the COF framework, acting as recognizable sites for C₃ H₆ gas, as shown by the adsorption measurements. Cu(I) COF is blended with 6FDA-DAM polymer to yield MMMs. This COF MMM exhibits selective and permeable separation of C₃ H₆ from C₃ H₈ (C₃ H₆ permeability of 44.7 barrer, C₃ H₆ /C₃ H₈ selectivity of 28.1). The high porosity and Cu(I) species contribute to the great improvement of separation performance by virtue of 2.3-fold increase in permeability and 2.2-fold increase in selectivity compared to pure 6FDA-DAM. The superior performance to those of most relevant reported MMMs demonstrates that the Cu(I) coordinated COF is an excellent candidate material for C₃ H₆ separation membranes.

Fabrication of the Antibiotic Sensor by the Multifunctional Stable Adjustable Luminescent Lanthanide Metal-Organic Frameworks

In recent years, the irrational use of antibiotics has become very widespread. It is necessary to regulate this phenomenon through antibiotic detection. In this work, a series of isomorphic Ln-MOFs (Ln = Tb³⁺ and Eu³⁺) were synthesized from 1,3,5-tri(4-carboxyphenyl)benzene (H₃L) and Ln³⁺ by the solvothermal method for the first time. A series of 1-Eu_xTb_1-x with different luminescence were doped by changing the molar ratio of Tb³⁺ and Eu³⁺. Ln³⁺ forms a 4-connected 2D network structure through self-assembly with fully deprotonated L^3-. It shows good chemical stability in water, and its luminescence is not affected by aqueous solutions with different pH values. 1-Eu demonstrates rapid and sensitive detection capabilities for MDZ and TET with good recyclability and low detection limits (10^-5). In order to increase the practicability of 1-Eu, two portable sensors have been prepared, in which the fluorescent film (Film@1-Eu) has a detection limit of 10^-4, and the sensitivity is only less than 10% of the titration results. A portable fluorescent test paper can reach the detection limit of 14.7 ppm. This study provides a new idea for the application of stable multifunctional materials in the field of fluorescence sensing.

Ultramicroporous Covalent Organic Framework Nanosheets with Functionality Pair for Membrane C2 H2 /C2 H4 Separation

Gas separation efficiency of covalent organic framework (COF) membrane can be greatly elevated through precise functionalization. A pair-functionalized COF membrane of 1,3,5-triformylphloroglucinol (TP) and isoquinoline-5,8-diamine (IQD) monomers in two and three nodes is designed and synthesized. TP-IQD is crystallized in a two-dimensional structure with a pore size of 6.5 Å and a surface area of 289 m²  g^-1 . This COF possesses N-O paired groups which cooperatively interact with C₂ H₂ instead of C₂ H₄ . TP-IQD nanosheets of ≈10 μm in width and ≈4 nm in thickness are prepared by mechanical exfoliation; they are further processed with 6FDA-ODA polymer into a hybrid membrane. High porosity and functionality pair of TP-IQD offer the membrane with significantly increased C₂ H₂ permeability and C₂ H₂ /C₂ H₄ selectivity which are 160 % and 430 % higher of pure 6FDA-ODA. The boosted performance demonstrates high efficiency of the pair-functionality strategy for the synthesis of separation-led COFs.

Benchmark single-step ethylene purification from ternary mixtures by a customized fluorinated anion-embedded MOF

Ethylene (C2H4) purification from multi-component mixtures by physical adsorption is a great challenge in the chemical industry. Herein, we report a GeF62- anion embedded MOF (ZNU-6) with customized pore structure and pore chemistry for benchmark one-step C2H4 recovery from C2H2 and CO2. ZNU-6 exhibits significantly high C2H2 (1.53 mmol/g) and CO2 (1.46 mmol/g) capacity at 0.01 bar. Record high C2H4 productivity is achieved from C2H2/CO2/C2H4 mixtures in a single adsorption process under various conditions. The separation performance is retained over multiple cycles and under humid conditions. The potential gas binding sites are investigated by density functional theory (DFT) calculations, which suggest that C2H2 and CO2 are preferably adsorbed in the interlaced narrow channel with high aff0inity. In-situ single crystal structures with the dose of C2H2, CO2 or C2H4 further reveal the realistic host-guest interactions. Notably, rare C2H2 clusters are formed in the narrow channel while two distinct CO2 adsorption locations are observed in the narrow channel and the large cavity with a ratio of 1:2, which accurately account for the distinct adsorption heat curves.

Dative B←N bonds based crystalline organic framework with permanent porosity for acetylene storage and separation

The utilization of dative B←N bonds for the creation of crystalline organic framework (BNOF) has increasingly received intensive interest; however, the shortage of permanent porosity is an obstacle that must be overcome to guarantee their application as porous materials. Here, we report the first microporous crystalline framework, BNOF-1, that is assembled through sole monomers, which can be scalably synthesized by the cheap 4-pyridine boronic acid. The 2D networks of BNOF-1 were stacked in parallel to generate a highly porous supramolecular open framework, which possessed not only the highest BET surface area of 1345 m² g^-1 amongst all of the BNOFs but also features a record-high uptake of C₂H₂ and CO₂ in covalent organic framework (COF) materials to date. Dynamic breakthrough experiments demonstrated that BNOF-1 material can efficiently separate C₂H₂/CO₂ mixtures. In addition, the network can be regenerated in organic solvents with no loss in performance, making its solution processable. We believe that BNOF-1 would greatly diversify the reticular chemistry and open new avenues for the application of BNOFs.

MIL-101-Cr/Fe/Fe-NH2 for Efficient Separation of CH4 and C3H8 from Simulated Natural Gas

Adsorptive separation based on porous solid adsorbents has emerged as an excellent effective alternative to energy-intensive conventional separation methods in a low energy cost and high working capacity manner. However, there are few stable mesoporous metal-organic frameworks (MOFs) for efficient purification of methane from other light hydrocarbons in natural gas. Herein, we report a series of stable mesoporous MOFs, MIL-101-Cr/Fe/Fe-NH2, for efficient separation of CH4 and C3H8 from a ternary mixture CH4/C2H6/C3H8. Experimental results show that all three MOFs possess excellent thermal, acid/basic, and hydrothermal stability. Single-component adsorption suggested that they have high C3H8 adsorption capacity and commendable selectivity for C3H8 and C2H6 over CH4. Transient breakthrough experiments further certified the ability of direct separation of CH4 from simulated natural gas and indirect recovery of C3H8 from the packing column. Theoretical calculations illustrated that the van der Waals force proportional to the molecular weight is the key factor and that the structural integrity and defect can impact separation performances.