In the field of crystallization-based chiral resolution, preferential crystallization is particularly interesting.

The metal sites of MIL-100(Fe), MIL-100(Fe,Al) and MIL-100(Al) MOFs were decorated with ethylenediamine (EN). Interestingly, the Al-containing MOFs presented hierachized porosity, and their structural integrity was maintained upon functionalization. Solution and solid-state NMR confirmed the grafting efficiency in the case of MIL-100(Al) and the presence of a free amine group. It was shown that MIL-100(Al) can be functionalized by only one EN molecule by trimeric Al3O cluster unit, whereas the two other aluminium sites are occupied by an hydroxyl and a water molecule. The -NH2 sites of the grafted ethylenediamine can be used for further post-functionalization through amine chemistry and is responsible for basicity of the functionalized material. Furthermore, the presence of coordinated water molecules on the Al-MOF is responsible for simultaneous Brønsted acidity and for a unique carbon dioxide sorption mecanism, that distinguishes this material from its iron and chromium counterparts.

Non-covalent interactions play an essential role in the folding and self-assembly of large biological assemblies. These interactions are not only a driving force for the formation of large structures but also control conformation and com-plementary shapes of subcomponents that promote the diversity of structures and functions of the resulting assemblies. Understanding how non-covalent interactions direct self-assembly and the effect of conformation and complementary shapes on self-assembled structures will help design artificial supramolecular systems with extended components and functions. Herein, we develop a strategy for controlling more complex self-assembly with lower symmetry and flexible building blocks that combine endohedral non-covalent interactions with a dual curvature in the ligand backbone to give additional shape complementarity. A Diels-Alder reaction was used to break the symmetry of the diazaanthracene units of the ligands to give dual curvature ligands with different shapes and endohedral groups (L1-L3). The self-assembly studies of these ligands demonstrated that non-covalent interactions and shape complementary effectively control the self-assembly and enable the design of cages for supramolecular catalysis.

While common in biological systems, building blocks with low symmetry and flexibility pose numerous problems for synthetic self-assembly such as the formation of isomers of assemblies that are usually difficult to distinguish and purify. We herein report a design and synthesis strategy relying on shape complementarity and conformational constraints in dual curvature ligands that effectively promotes high selectivity during self-assembly and self-sorting of metal-organic assemblies. Three aromatic amide-based ligands (L1-L3) with a central 1,8-diazatriptycene core were designed and used for self-assembly with Pd2+. While hundreds of stereoisomers based on the conformational flexibility around the amides and the unsymmetrical non-planar structure of the core are possible upon coordination with the metal, the constraints designed into the ligands direct the self-assembly towards only a single Pd2L4 cage (L1) or Pd4L8 double-walled metallomacrocycle (L2) structure, even in mixtures of the ligands. We further demonstrate that this structural approach and the modularity of the ligand synthesis affords ready access to the first deep endohedral functionalized double-walled Pd4L8 cavitands (L3). These results highlight the potential of this new design strategy and open the door to selectively functionalized cavity-based architectures for numerous applications.