Strategically tailoring the electronic configuration of electrocatalysts through the incorporation of additional metal ions serves as a highly effective approach for boosting electrochemical glucose oxidation performance. In this work, a series of Co-doped nickel 5-methylsalicate (MeSA) metal organic framework (MOF) composites (NiCo-MeSA) were developed via a one-step solvothermal method. The NiCo-MeSA complex exhibits a porous MOF structure, promoting the electrolyte diffusion and access to active sites. Moreover, the introduction of Co²⁺ effectively regulates the electronic structure of Ni-MeSA catalysts, thereby improving both the selectivity toward glucose and stability of electrochemical glucose oxidation reaction (GOR). The optimized NiCo-MeSA nanocomposites demonstrate high sensitivity of 4.55 mA·mM⁻¹·cm⁻², an ultralow detection limit of 0.54 µM (S/N = 3, where N indicates response standard deviation and S represents the calibration curve’s slope), and exceptional long-term stability. Significantly, this design paradigm demonstrates broad applicability, as evidenced by the successful extension to isostructural NiM-SA analogs (M = Mn, Fe, Cu) under identical synthetic conditions, establishing bimetallic 5-methylsalicylate framework as a versatile and robust electrocatalyst platform.

Creating a specific shape with hierarchically porous structure of metal-organic frameworks represents an effective strategy to enhance the adsorption and photocatalytic performance yet remains rather challenging. Herein, we present a facile linker competitive coordination induced interface assembly strategy to synthesize a series of star-concave metal-organic frameworks (MOFs) (Fe-MIL-101) with rich hierarchical pores. This strategy of star-concave Fe-MIL-101 depends on the electronegativity difference of the two linkers to produce an in-situ oriented growth with controllable kinetics nucleation and structural evolution. As a result, the optimized star-concave Fe-MIL-101-2 with multiple physical-chemical effects endows enhanced visible-light trapping, preferred charge separation, and optimized the local electronic structure. In comparison with the slightly concave Fe-MIL-101 and solid octahedron Fe-MIL-101-NH₂, the star-concave Fe-MIL-101-2 displays a clear superiority in the adsorption-photoreduction of Cr(VI) under visible-light irradiation. Furthermore, the X-ray absorption fine structure spectroscopy, finite element method, and density functional theory calculations are performed to reveal the local electronic structure of star-concave Fe-MIL-101-2, understanding the mechanisms behind the boosting synergistic adsorption-photoreduction of Cr(VI) removal performance. This work provides a new perspective for the rational construction of MOFs-based photocatalysts with high activity for Cr(VI) removal through shape engineering.

Metal-organic framework (MOF) membranes have been extensively researched as an innovative membrane material for H₂/CO₂ separation. The preparation of MOF membranes can be extended by constructing MOF membranes with homogeneous heterogeneous structure and the MOF membranes with high permeance and high selectivity can be prepared. Here, we use the chelation-assisted interfacial growth process to construct a seeding layer, and then prepare Co-Zn-ZIF-L membranes with a homogeneous heterogeneous structure by secondary growth for the efficient separation of H₂/CO₂. The resulting Co-Zn-ZIF-L membranes show an H₂ permeance of 2156 GPU and H₂/CO₂ selectivity of 31.6 at 298 K and 1.0 bar, surpassing the Robeson upper bound (2008). Furthermore, the Co-Zn-ZIF-L membrane has a H₂/CO₂ separation stability of 65 h and can efficiently separate to obtain pure H₂.

The uncontrolled dendrite growth and volume change of Li metal during cycling lead to a short cycle life and safety concerns for Li-metal batteries, which hinders their practical application. Herein, we report the facile and energy-saving production of a three-dimensional (3D) CuZn matrix decorated with in-situ formed ZnO nano seeds (ZnO NS@3D CuZn) in pores and tunnels, which can serve as an anode current collector for dendrite-free Li-metal batteries. The 3D porous framework reduced the anode current density and accommodated Li volume change during the charge/discharge process. More importantly, the lithiophilic ZnO nano seeds induced fast Li deposition into the pores and tunnels of the 3D structure to effectively confine the deposited Li. As a positive effect, the volume change and Li dendrite growth during cycling are greatly suppressed. The half-cell with the ZnO NS@3D CuZn current collector exhibited a Coulombic efficiency (CE) of above 98% for over 320 and 240 cycles at 0.5 and 1 mA·cm⁻², respectively. The Li@ZnO NS@3D CuZn symmetric cell achieves a lifespan of over 1500 h. Moreover, the Li@ZnO NS@3D CuZn||LiFePO₄ full cell achieves a superb average CE of 99.4% and a long life of 600 cycles before the capacity retention rate decays to 90%.

Porphyrinoid metal-organic frameworks (MOFs) with dual effective uranium uptake sites were synthesized through combined in-situ and post-synthetic method. The MOF10@5 demonstrates the uptake amount of uranium reaches 1476 mg/g under visible-light irradiation. The PN-MOF10@5 with dual uranyl uptake sites yields the amount of extracting uranyl of 1590 mg/g under visible-light irradiation. The density functional theory (DFT) calculations reveal strong interaction between uranyl and dual uranyl effective active sites. These MOFs demonstrate a powerful synthesis strategy for uranium extraction materials with dual effective active sites.

Aqueous rechargeable batteries (ARBs) are generally safer than non-aqueous analogues, they are also less-expensive, and more friendly to the environment. However, the inherent disadvantage of the narrow electrochemical window of H₂O seriously restricts the energy density and output voltage of ARBs, especially aqueous rechargeable Fe-based batteries. Herein, we introduce a new battery system: the anode contains C@Fe/Fe₂O₃ composite, which is interfaced with an alkaline electrolyte; the cathode contains LiMn₂O₄ in contact with a neutral electrolyte. A Li⁺-conducting membrane is carefully selected to decouple the electrode–electrolyte, which effectively widens the electrochemical window to above 2.65 V, thereby enables an aqueous rechargeable iron battery. Its average output voltage is 1.83 V and its energy density is 235.3 Wh/kg at 549 W/kg. In this work, we propose the energy storage mechanism with the aid of density functional theory (DFT). The calculated reduction potential of the anode agrees with the experimental value. Furthermore, this battery system demonstrates long cycle lifespan of approximately 2500 cycles at 2 A/g, corresponding to a capacity retention of 82.1%. These results are very far superior than those of mainstream aqueous rechargeable Fe-based batteries, which guarantee future investigation for storing electricity energy.

Metal-organic frameworks (MOFs) are favored in the fields of adsorption, separation, catalysis, electrochemistry, and magnetism due to their advantages of large specific surface area, high porosity, controllable pore size adjustment, and dispersion of metal active sites. The application of MOFs involves multiple fields, which requires that MOFs have good water stability, as gaseous and liquid water inevitably exist in industrial processes. In this paper, the research status of the stability of MOFs in aqueous solutions was reviewed in recent years, including the design and synthesis, the influencing factors, and the applications of MOFs in water stability.

Cu-based materials are seldom reported as oxygen evolution reaction (OER) electrocatalysts due to their inherent electron orbital configuration, which makes them difficult to adsorb oxygen-intermediates during OER. Reasonably engineering the hierarchical architectures and the electronic structures can improve the performance of Cu-based OER catalysts, such as constructing multilevel morphology, inducing the porous materials, improving the Cu valence, building heterostructures, doping heteroatoms, etc. In this work, copper-1,3,5-benzenetricarboxylate (HKUST-1) octahedra in-situ grow on the Cu nanorod (NR)-supported N-doped carbon microplates, meanwhile an active layer of Cu(OH)₂ forms on the surface of the original conductive Cu NRs. The octahedral HKUST-1, serving as a spacer between the microplates, greatly improves the porosity and increases the available active sites, facilitating the mass transport and electron transfer, thus resulting in greatly enhanced OER performance.

In recent years, since water pollution has aroused great public concern, various carbon materials have already been widely applied for water treatment. In this respect, tremendous effort has been made to provide different synthesis methods of carbon materials. Among all carbon materials, metal-organic framework (MOF) derived carbon has always been favored as it possesses several appealing merits such as high specific surface area, large pore volume, and outstanding chemical stability. This review presents the latest development of MOFs as templates and precursors for the fabrication of various carbon materials, including porous carbon, nanocarbon, and graphene, which are pyrolyzed at different temperatures. The article also emphasizes on their future trends and perspectives on the application of water treatment.

With the increasing demand for fuel causing serious environmental pollution, it is urgent to develop new and environmentally friendly energy conversion devices. These energy conversion devices, however, require good, inexpensive materials for electrodes and so on. The multifunctional properties of porphyrins enable framework materials (e.g., metal-organic frameworks and covalent organic frameworks) to be applied in energy conversion devices due to their simple synthesis, high chemical stability, abundant metallic active sites, adjustable crystalline structure and high specific surface area. Herein, the types of porphyrin structural blocks are briefly reviewed. They can be used as organic ligands or directly assembled with framework materials to generate high-performance electro-/photo-catalysts. These types of catalysts applied in electro-/photo-catalytic water splitting, electro-/photo-catalytic carbon dioxide reduction, and electrocatalytic oxygen reduction are also summarized and introduced. At the end of the article, we present the challenges of porphyrin-based framework materials in the above application and corresponding solutions. We expect porphyrin-based framework materials to flourish energy conversion in the coming years.