Skip to main content

Thank you for visiting nature.com. You are using a browser version with limited support for CSS. To obtain the best experience, we recommend you use a more up to date browser (or turn off compatibility mode in Internet Explorer). In the meantime, to ensure continued support, we are displaying the site without styles and JavaScript.

Metal–organic frameworks

Size almost doesn't matter

Nature Materials volume 6, pages 718–719 (2007)Cite this article

A newly developed microdiffraction technique for solving the structure of very small single crystals hails a new era in the structural characterization of complex materials.

Metal–organic frameworks (MOFs) are an important class of solid-state materials that offer great potential to unravel many challenges in the realms of energy and health1,2,3,4. They are metal–ligand networks, held together by strong bonds between the inorganic and the organic moieties. In the past decade, MOF materials, as a result of their unique attributes, have dramatically increased the limits of porous crystalline materials. A few of their beneficial traits include a broad variation in structure owing to the great diversity of metal-coordination geometries and the accessible choice of polytopic organic linkers, the ability to tune pore size and functionality enabling access to unprecedented high surface areas, extra-large cavities and very low crystalline framework densities, and the ability to systematically design and synthesize crystalline solids, using reticular chemistry or scale chemistry5,6,7, enabling crystallographic structural characterization.

This is a preview of subscription content

Access options

Buy article

Get time limited or full article access on ReadCube.

$32.00

Buy

All prices are NET prices.

Figure 1: X-ray crystal structure of MIL-110.

References

  1. Eddaoudi, M. et al. Acc. Chem. Res. 34, 319–330 (2001).

    CAS  Article  Google Scholar 

  2. Moulton, B. & Zaworotko, M. J. Chem. Rev. 101, 1629–1658 (2001).

    CAS  Article  Google Scholar 

  3. Ferey, G. et al. Science 309, 2040–2042 (2005).

    CAS  Article  Google Scholar 

  4. Kitagawa, S., Kitaura, R. & Noro, S.-I. Angew. Chem. Int. Edn 43, 2334–2375 (2004).

    CAS  Article  Google Scholar 

  5. Yaghi, O. M. et al. Nature 423, 705–714 (2003).

    CAS  Article  Google Scholar 

  6. Ferey, G. J. Solid State Chem. 152, 37–48 (2000).

    CAS  Article  Google Scholar 

  7. Liu, Y. L., Kravtsov V. C., Larsen, R. & Eddaoudi, M. Chem. Commun. 14, 1488–1490 (2006).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  8. Volkringer, C. et al. Nature Mater. 6, 760–764 (2007).

    CAS  Article  Google Scholar 

  9. Ferey. G. in Introduction to Zeolite Science and Practice (eds Ceijka, J., vas Bekkum, H., Corma, A. and Schuth F.) 327–374 (Studies in Surface Science and Catalysis Series, Vol. 168, Elsevier, 2007).

    Book  Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Mohamed Eddaoudi is in the Department of Chemistry at the University of South Florida 4202E, Fowler Avenue, CHE 205A Tampa, Florida 33620-5250, USA. eddaoudi@cas.usf.edu,

    Mohamed Eddaoudi

Authors
  1. Mohamed Eddaoudi
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Rights and permissions

Reprints and Permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Eddaoudi, M. Size almost doesn't matter. Nature Mater 6, 718–719 (2007). https://doi.org/10.1038/nmat2020

Download citation

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/nmat2020

Search

Advanced search

Quick links

Nature Briefing

Sign up for the Nature Briefing newsletter — what matters in science, free to your inbox daily.

Get the most important science stories of the day, free in your inbox. Sign up for Nature Briefing