Colloquium on Porous Frameworks: Day 1

Program Porous Frameworks ColloquiumToday the CMD26 conference started in Groningen, and with its kick-off also our own 2-day colloquium on porous frameworks (aka MOFs, COFs and Zeolites) was launched. During the two sessions of the day, the focus mainly went out to the Zeolites, with Prof. Emiel Hensen of the Technical university of Eindhoven introducing us to the subject and discussing how new zeolites could be designed in a more rational way. He showed us how the template used during synthesis plays a crucial role in the final growth and structure. Dr. Nakato explained how alkali-metal nanoclusters can undergo insulator to metal transitions when incorporated in zeolites (it is due to the competition between electron-electron repulsion and electron-phonon coupling), while Dr. De Wijs informed us on how Al T-sites need to be ordered and assigned in zeolites to allow for the prediction of NMR parameters.

After the coffee break Dr. Palcic, from the Rudjer Boskovic Institute in Croatia, taught us about the role of heteroatoms in zeolites. She told us that even though more than 2 million theoretical structures exist, only 231 have officially been recognized as having been synthesized, so there is a lot more work to be done. She also showed that to get stable zeolites with pores larger than 7-8 Angstrom one needs to have 3 and 4-membered rings in the structure, since these lead to more rigid configurations. Unfortunately these rings are themselves less stable, and need to be stabilized by different atoms at the T-sites.

Dr. Vandichel, still blushing from his tight traveling scheme, changed the subject from zeolites to MOFs, in providing new understanding in the role of defects in MOFs on their catalytic performance. Dr. Liu changed the subject even further with the introduction of COFs and showing us how Hydrogen atoms migrate through these materials. Using the wisdom of Bruce Lee :

You must be shapeless, formless, like water. When you pour water in a cup, it becomes the cup. When you pour water in a bottle, it becomes the bottle. When you pour water in a teapot, it becomes the teapot.

he clarified how water behaves inside these porous materials. Our first colloquium day was closed by Ir. Rohling, who took us back to the zeolite scene (although he was comparing the zeolites to enzymes). He discussed how reactivity in zeolites can be tweaked by the confinement of the reacting agents, and how this can be used for molecule identification. More importantly he showed how multiple active site collaborate, making chemical reactions much easier than one would expect from single active site models.

After all was said and done, it was time to relax a little during the conference welcome reception. And now time to prepare for tomorrow, day 2 of our colloquium on porous frameworks.

 

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