The design of advanced microporous materials is critical to many biomedical and energy-related technologies that require the efficient storage or transport of small molecules, including drug delivery, bioimaging, and gas separations. Despite their high internal surface areas and substantial tunability, metal-organic frameworks (MOFs) are often limited as functional building blocks for these technologies due to chemical decomposition or physical aggregation in water. Although modifying MOF surfaces with polymers can help stabilize and prevent aggregation in colloidal MOF suspensions, the MOF-polymer interface itself is still poorly understood, particularly in aqueous environments. Here, we will discuss efforts to disperse MOF nanocrystals in water using non-covalently associated amphiphilic polymers and to probe the microscopic nature of the MOF-polymer interface in aqueous solutions.

Manipulating the interface between polymers and metal–organic framework nanoparticles in aqueous environments

ACS Fall 2021

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