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Sustainable

Human-centric

Innovation:

Nanopore

Engineering

“For centuries, humans have marveled at the potential locked within porous materials. Yet, it is only in recent years that researchers have gained the ability to delicately regulate and functionalize pores at the nanoscale. Pores have sizes, shapes, hierarchy, heterogeneity, communication, and synergy. Nanopore engineering encompasses a broad range of materials. From hollow molecular cages to metal-organic frameworks (MOFs) filled with hierarchical pores, these structures are the key to creating ordered architectures capable of channeling matter and energy—an essential requirement for catalysis, energy storage, chiral separation and recognition. In essence, nanopore engineering is the art of orchestrating molecules, harnessing the dynamic nature of coordination and covalent bonds to craft functionalized hierarchical structures, from the microscale to the mesoscale and beyond. It is a journey towards a sustainable, human-centric future, where innovation converges with responsibility to shape a world that uses its natural resources more responsibly and efficiently.”

Bioinspired Framework Catalysts

Chem. Rev. 2023, 123, 5347-5420.

Enzymatic catalysis has fueled considerable interest from chemists due to its high efficiency and selectivity. However, the structural complexity and vulnerability hamper the application potentials of

Laser Lithography on Nanoporous MOFs

Angew. Chem. Int. Ed. 2020, 59, 11349-11354.

Hierarchically porous metal–organic frameworks (HP-MOFs) facilitate mass transfer due to mesoporosity while preserving the advantage of microporosity. This unique feature endows HP-MOFs with remarkabl

Multi-center Luminescence Sensor

Nat. Protoc. 2023, 18, 1621-1640.

Luminescent sensing materials are attractive for environmental analysis due to their potential for high selectivity, excellent sensitivity and rapid (even instantaneous) response towards targeted anal

Amino-acid-derived Frameworks for Chiral Separation

ACS Cent. Sci. 2022, 8, 562-570.

Efficient enantioselective separation using porous materials requires tailored and diverse pore environments to interact with chiral substrates; yet, current cage materials usually feature uniform por

Creating Hierarchical Pores in MOFs via Post-Synthetic Reactions

Nat. Protoc. 2023, 18, 604-625.

Metal–organic frameworks (MOFs) demonstrate promise for a multitude of applications owing to their high porosity and surface area. However, the majority of conventional MOFs possess only micropores wi

Topology Exploration in Rare-Earth MOFs

JACS Au 2023, 3, 1337-1347.

A linker design strategy is developed to attain novel polynuclear rare-earth (RE) metal–organic frameworks (MOFs) with unprecedented topologies. We uncover the critical role of ortho-functionalized tr

Morphology Transcription in MOFs

ACS Materials Lett. 2021, 3, 738-743.

Controlled morphology replication is a powerful method to fabricate materials with designable morphology and functions. However, this process is usually restricted to simple systems containing limited

Multi-component and Hierarchical MOFs

Chem. Soc. Rev. 2019, 48, 4823-4853.

Multi-component hierarchically porous materials are an emerging class of materials with tailored compositions, tunable distribution and sophisticated applications. An increasing demand for multifuncti