Crystallisation of solvothermally synthesised ZIF-8 investigated at the bulk, single crystal and surface level

Metastable metal imidazolates: development of targeted syntheses by combining experimental and theoretical investigations of the formation mechanisms

“…It is also demonstrated how the kinetics of particle nucleation and growth can be influenced by the addition of simple monodentate ligands that act as coordination or deprotonation modulators, thereby enabling the control of crystal size and morphology [22]. Also, the solvothermal crystallization of ZIF-8 in two different solvent systems, MeOH/ sodium formate [25] and dimethylformamide (DMF) [26], has been investigated using in-situ energy-dispersive (ED) XRD and an ex-situ gravimetric method, respectively. Evaluation of the crystallization curves revealed in both cases that nucleation was slower than growth, i.e., the rate-limiting process.…”

“…It has been argued that the higher Arrhenius activation energies estimated for the DMFmediated crystallization compared to the MeOH/sodium formate-mediated crystallization may reflect the influence of the partial decomposition of DMF into dimethylamine and formate ions both of which can act as base (deprotonation modulator). The bases induce ZIF-8 formation, a task that is fulfilled in MeOH by the initially added sodium formate [26]. The range of applied methods has been expanded in a study of the crystallization of microrods of a zinc(II) benzimidazolate, ZIF-7, in DMF/diethylamine (DEF) at room temperature by combining in-situ SAXS/WAXS with in-situ quick-scanning extended X-ray absorption spectroscopy (QEXAFS) and DFT calculations on model complexes, which yielded significant information on all relevant length scales [27].…”

Enhancing photocatalytic activity of titanium dioxide through incorporation of MIL‐53(Fe) toward degradation of organic dye

“…[17,18] Here, we demonstrate the incorporation of a metal-organic framework (MOF) as well as a calcined product of the MOF to modify surface-active sites of TiO 2 for a better photocatalytic activity. [21][22][23][24][25] MIL-53(Fe), in particular, is a promising MOF for the removal of organic pollutants due to its good absorption property as well as responses to the UV-Vis region, which are at a lower bandgap energy (2.88 eV). [19,20] To date, MOFs have displayed various properties, for instance gas adsorption, adsorption of organic and inorganic pollutants, sensing, separations, catalysis, photocatalysis, and drug delivery.…”

Facile formation of ZIF-8 thin films on ZnO nanorods

“…However, this increase is much less significant when using DMF and could indicate different crystal growth kinetics. 39 The differences in reaction progression are evident in Figure 5. While the use of methanol preserves the nanorod morphology throughout the reaction, this is not the case for DMF as large crystals of ZIF-8 coat the surface.…”