Bispropylurea bridged polysilsesquioxane: A microporous MOF-like material for molecular recognition.
Chemosphere
; 276: 130181, 2021 Aug.
Article
in En
| MEDLINE
| ID: mdl-33735650
ABSTRACT
Microporous organosilicas assembled from polysilsesquioxane (POSS) building blocks are promising materials that are yet to be explored in-depth. Here, we investigate the processing and molecular structure of bispropylurea bridged POSS (POSS-urea), synthesised through the acidic condensation of 1,3-bis(3-(triethoxysilyl)propyl)urea (BTPU). Experimentally, we show that POSS-urea has excellent functionality for molecular recognition toward acetonitrile with an adsorption level of 74 mmol/g, which compares favourably to MOFs and zeolites, with applications in volatile organic compounds (VOC). The acetonitrile adsorption capacity was 132-fold higher relative to adsorption capacity for toluene, which shows the pores are highly selective towards acetonitrile adsorption due to their size and arrangement. Theoretically, our tight-binding density functional and molecular dynamics calculations demonstrated that this BTPU based POSS is microporous with an irregular placement of the pores. Structural studies confirm maximal pore sizes of â¼1 nm, with POSS cages possessing an approximate edge length of â¼3.16 Å.
Key words
Full text:
1
Collection:
01-internacional
Database:
MEDLINE
Main subject:
Organosilicon Compounds
/
Volatile Organic Compounds
Language:
En
Journal:
Chemosphere
Year:
2021
Document type:
Article