Unraveling the relative location of mixed-metals in multivariate metal-organic frameworks for tailor-made photocatalytic tandem reactions

Photocatalytic reduction of carbon dioxide (CO2) is a promising approach for mitigating CO2 emission and transforming it into chemical energy and value-added chemicals.

In this context, porous materials, particularly metal-organic frameworks (MOFs), have emerged as tailor-made solids with desired structural arrangement representing the most attractive candidates due to their high tunability compared to traditional inorganic solids.

These structures are ideal platforms for introducing heterogeneity to enrich the chemical environment in multivariate (MTV) frameworks.

Among them, mixed-metal MOFs are of high interest due to the inherent properties of each metal that can be incorporated and combined into the same material.Herein, MUVCATMOF proposes using MTV-MOFs composed of mixed-metals for tailor-made photocatalytic tandem reactions to transform CO2 into value-added chemicals.

The idea is based on creating a highly active catalytic pore environment in the structure where the chemical activity of each metal will be exploited towards each catalytic reaction and coupled the products synergestically.

In this specific case, three active sites will be designed for tandem reactions of the CO2 photoreduction into carbon monoxide (CO), hydrogen (H2) generation, and subsequent coupling of CO and H2 into hydrocarbons or alcohols.This research project consists of three individual objectives. The first objective is to develop new methodologies for the controlled synthesis of MTV-MOFs.

The second objective is to establish novel characterisation techniques to understand the relative location of mixed-metals in MTV-MOFs.

The third objective is demonstrating the photocatalytic CO2 reduction and subsequen tandem reactions of tailor-made MTV-MOFs.This research's originality will provide novel rational design tools and characterisation techniques for the controlled formation of MTV-MOFs, contributing to a higher activity and selectivity of catalytic tailor-made materials.