A Porous Cobalt Tetraphosphonate Metal-Organic Framework: Accurate Structure and Guest Molecule Location Determined by Continuous-Rotation Electron Diffraction.

Single-crystal electron diffraction has shown to be powerful for structure determination of nano- and submicron-sized crystals that are too small to be studied by single-crystal X-ray diffraction. However, it has been very challenging to obtain high quality electron diffraction data from beam sensitive crystals such as metal-organic frameworks (MOFs). It is even more difficult to locate guest species in the pores of MOF crystals. Here, we present synthesis of a novel porous cobalt MOF with 1D channels, [Co2 (Ni-H4 TPPP)]⋅2 DABCO⋅6 H2 O, (denoted Co-CAU-36; DABCO=1,4-diazabicyclo[2.2.2]octane), and its structure determination using continuous rotation electron diffraction (cRED) data. By combining a fast hybrid electron detector with low sample temperature (96 K), high resolution (0.83-1.00 Å) cRED data could be obtained from eight Co-CAU-36 crystals. Independent structure determinations were conducted using each of the eight cRED datasets. We show that all atoms in the MOF framework could be located. More importantly, we demonstrate for the first time that organic molecules in the pores, which were previously difficult to find, could be located using the cRED data. A comparison of eight independent structure determinations using different datasets shows that structural models differ only on average by 0.03(2) Šfor the framework atoms and 0.10(6) and 0.16(12) Šfor DABCO and water molecules, respectively.

Highly stable and porous porphyrin-based zirconium and hafnium phosphonates - electron crystallography as an important tool for structure elucidation.

The Ni-metallated porphyrin-based tetraphosphonic acid (Ni-tetra(4-phosphonophenyl)porphyrin, Ni-H8TPPP) was used for the synthesis of highly porous metal phosphonates containing the tetravalent cations Zr4+ and Hf4+. The compounds were thoroughly characterized regarding their sorption properties towards N2 and H2O as well as thermal and chemical stability. During the synthesis optimization the reaction time could be substantially decreased under stirring from 24 to 3 h in glass vials. M-CAU-30, [M2(Ni-H2TPPP)(OH/F)2]·H2O (M = Zr, Hf) shows exceptionally high specific surface areas for metal phosphonates of aBET = 1070 and 1030 m2 g-1 for Zr- and Hf-CAU-30, respectively, which are very close/correspond to the theoretical values of 1180 and 1030 m2 g-1. CAU-30 is always obtained as mixtures with one mol ZrO2/HfO2 per formula unit as proven by TEM, electron diffraction, TG and elemental analysis. Hence experimentally derived specific surface areas are 970 and 910 m2 g-1, respectively. M-CAU-30 is chemically stable in the pH range 0 to 12 in HCl/NaOH and thermally up to 420 °C in air as determined by variable-temperature powder X-ray diffraction (VT-PXRD). The crystal structure of M-CAU-30 was determined by combining electron diffraction tomography for structure solution and powder X-ray diffraction data for the structure refinement. The crystal structure consists of chains of corner sharing MO6 octahedra interconnected by the partly deprotonated linker molecules Ni-H2TPPP6-. Thus 1D channels with pore diameters of 1.3 × 2.0 nm are formed. The redox activity of Zr-CAU-30 was investigated by cyclic voltammetry resulting in a reversible redox process at a half-wave potential of E1/2 = -0.649 V.

Crystalline and permanently porous porphyrin-based metal tetraphosphonates.

The new porphyrin-based tetraphosphonic acid (Ni-H8TPPP) was employed in the synthesis of four isostructural MOFs of composition [M(Ni-H6TPPP)(H2O)], denoted CAU-29 (M = Mn, Co, Ni, Cd). Ni-CAU-29 was thoroughly characterized regarding its thermal and chemical stability as well as for proton conductivity.

A precursor method for the synthesis of new Ce(iv) MOFs with reactive tetracarboxylate linkers.

A precursor method has been developed to synthesize Ce(iv) MOFs that could not be prepared directly from Ce(iv) salts. Starting from Ce6 clusters, two Ce-UiO-66 analogues and four tetracarboxylate-based Ce(iv) MOFs could be synthesized. The applied method facilitates framework formation by evading reactive individual Ce(iv)-ions thereby paving the way for further development of Ce-MOFs.

Nanoscale Synthesis of Two Porphyrin-Based MOFs with Gallium and Indium.

Two porphyrin-based metal-organic frameworks (MOFs) containing gallium or indium, [Ga2(OH)2(H2TCPP)]·3DMF·3H2O (Ga-PMOF) and [In2(OH)2(H2TCPP)]·3DMF·4H2O (In-PMOF) (H6TCPP = 4-tetracarboxyphenylporphyrin), were discovered using high-throughput methods. The structure was refined by the Rietveld-method starting from the structure model of Al-PMOF, [Al2(OH)2(H2TCPP)]. The new PMOFs exhibit BET surface areas between 1150 and 1400 m(2) g(-1) and are also porous toward CO2 (Ga-PMOF, 15.2 wt %; In-PMOF, 12.9 wt %). They are thermally stable in air up to 330 °C, but show limited chemical stabilities toward acids and bases. In order to achieve size control, different synthesis routes were investigated, i.e., batch synthesis at different temperatures (yield: In-PMOF-bs-th 96%, Ga-PMOF-bs-th 87%), ultrasound-assisted synthesis (yield: In-PMOF-bs-us 85%), and continuous-flow synthesis (yield: Ga-PMOF-cf 71%). By using these different methods we could control the nucleation rate and the crystal size. The crystal sizes were found to vary about 60 to 160 nm and 70 to 130 nm for Ga- and In-PMOF, respectively, which was proven by dynamic light scattering (DLS), powder X-ray diffraction (PXRD), scanning electron microscopy (SEM), and transmission electron microscopy (TEM) measurements.