The resultant MOFs exhibit both superhydrophobicity and oleophobicity, while retaining high crystallinity and intact porosity
Single-crystalline Metal-Organic Framework (MOF) materials show great promise for practical applications and have been extensively investigated for applications in gas storage and separation, carbon capture, catalysis etc. However, in order to be practically applicable, they need to maintain their properties over long spans of time, under a variety of environments, including high levels of humidity and presence of organic vapors. For this purpose, scientists from the Zhejiang University in China and from the University of South Florida developed a procedure for the functionalization of the exterior crystal surfaces with perfluoroalkyl groups, rendering them amphiphobic (i.e. both superhydrophobic and oleophobic). The treated crystals are structurally identical to the untreated ones, as revealed by single crystal X-ray diffraction measurements performed at the ChemMatCARS Crystallography facility on 15-IDB. Following the perfluoroalkyl treatment, the crystals withstood prolonged exposure to 100% relative humidity CO2 atmosphere, showing no degradation.
Imparting amphiphobicity on single-crystalline porous materials
Qi Sun1,2, Hongming He2, Wen-Yang Gao2, Briana Aguila2, Lukasz Wojtas2, Zhifeng Dai1, Jixue Li2, Yu‑Sheng Chen4, Feng-Shou Xiao1 & Shengqian Ma2
1Key Lab of Applied Chemistry of Zhejiang Province and Department of Chemistry, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou 310028, China
2Department of Chemistry, University of South Florida, Tampa, Florida 33620, USA
3Electron Microscopy Centre, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou 310027, China
4ChemMatCARS, Center for Advanced Radiation Sources, The University of Chicago, Argonne, Illinois 60439, USA