New metal-free MOFs show early promise for nuclear chemistry

Metal-free organic frameworks, featuring inexpensive and abundant non-metallic elements, have been designed and then made with the help of computational crystal-structure prediction software.

It is hoped the new materials will have a range of applications such as catalysis, water capture and hydrogen storage and offer an alternative to their metal-based equivalents.

The researchers, who are based at the Universities of Liverpool, Southampton and Nottingham, used computational design methods in combination with synthetic know-how to develop non-metal organic porous framework (N-MOF) materials using non-metallic ions such as chloride.