The application potential of metal-organic frameworks was first discovered around 20 years ago, and almost 100,000 such hybrid porous materials have since been identified. There are great hopes for technical applications, especially for flexible MOFs. As shock absorbers, for example, they could react to sudden high pressure by closing their pores and losing volume, i.e. deforming plastically. Or they could separate chemical substances from each other like a sponge by absorbing them into their pores and releasing them again under pressure. “This would require much less energy than the usual distillation process,” explains Rochus Schmid. However, only a few such flexible MOFs have been identified to date.
Click here for original story, Metal-organic frameworks become flexible
Source: Phys.org