A siloxane-based hexacarboxylic acid has been prepared and applied in the construction of new hybrid MOF materials.

This commentary responds to the Covid-19 pandemic which poses a serious challenge for the delivery of “wet laboratory” practical education. We discuss the “Chemical Kitchen” project, which teaches laboratory skills and the scientific method through the parallel discipline of gastronomy and its transformation into a home-based program: how it came to be, its successes to date, and our plans to deploy it for remote delivery in the uncertain future.

A series of 'light metal' MOFs containing SBUs based on Li + and Na + cations have been prepared using the silicon-centered linkers MexSi(p-C6H4CO2H)4-x (x = 2, 1, 0). The unipositive charge, small size, and oxophilic nature of the metal cations gives rise to some unusual and unique secondary building units (SBUs), including a 3D nodal structure built from sodium and oxygen ions when using the triacid linker (x = 1). The same linker with Li + cations generated a chiral, helical SBU, formed from achiral starting materials. 1D rod SBUs are observed for the diacid (x = 2) and tetra-acid (x = 0) linkers with both Li + and Na + cations, where the larger size of Na + compared to Li + leads to subtle differences in the constitution of the metal nodes.

A new approach to the development of MOF materials with low water affinity is presented using siloxane-derived linkers. The low water affinity is conferred by the linker without the requirement of any post-synthetic processing apart from activation.