Harnessing Electrostatic Interactions for Enhanced Conductivity in Metal-Organic Frameworks
An-An Zhang,
Xiyue Cheng,
Xu He,
Wei Liu,
Shuiquan Deng,
Rong Cao,
Tian-Fu Liu
Affiliations
An-An Zhang
Department of Chemistry, School of Chemistry and Materials Science, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, Anhui 230026, China; State Key Laboratory of Structural Chemistry, Fujian Institute of Research on the Structure of Matter, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Fuzhou, Fujian 350002, China
Xiyue Cheng
State Key Laboratory of Structural Chemistry, Fujian Institute of Research on the Structure of Matter, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Fuzhou, Fujian 350002, China
Xu He
State Key Laboratory of Structural Chemistry, Fujian Institute of Research on the Structure of Matter, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Fuzhou, Fujian 350002, China
Wei Liu
State Key Laboratory of Structural Chemistry, Fujian Institute of Research on the Structure of Matter, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Fuzhou, Fujian 350002, China
Shuiquan Deng
State Key Laboratory of Structural Chemistry, Fujian Institute of Research on the Structure of Matter, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Fuzhou, Fujian 350002, China
Rong Cao
Department of Chemistry, School of Chemistry and Materials Science, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, Anhui 230026, China; State Key Laboratory of Structural Chemistry, Fujian Institute of Research on the Structure of Matter, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Fuzhou, Fujian 350002, China; University of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100049, China
Tian-Fu Liu
State Key Laboratory of Structural Chemistry, Fujian Institute of Research on the Structure of Matter, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Fuzhou, Fujian 350002, China; University of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100049, China
The poor electrical conductivity of metal-organic frameworks (MOFs) has been a stumbling block for its applications in many important fields. Therefore, exploring a simple and effective strategy to regulate the conductivity of MOFs is highly desired. Herein, anionic guest molecules are incorporated inside the pores of a cationic MOF (PFC-8), which increases its conductivity by five orders of magnitude while maintaining the original porosity. In contrast, the same operation in an isoreticular neutral framework (PFC-9) does not bring such a significant change. Theoretical studies reveal that the guest molecules, stabilized inside pores through electrostatic interaction, play the role of electron donors as do in semiconductors, bringing in an analogous n-type semiconductor mechanism for electron conduction. Therefore, we demonstrate that harnessing electrostatic interaction provides a new way to regulate the conductivity of MOFs without necessarily altering the original porous structure. This strategy would greatly broaden MOFs’ application potential in electronic and optoelectronic technologies.
