Plasma-Induced Defects Enhance the Visible-Light Photocatalytic Activity of MIL-125(Ti)-NH for Overall Water Splitting.

Defect engineering in metal-organic frameworks is commonly performed by using thermal or chemical treatments. Herein we report that oxygen plasma treatment generates structural defects on MIL-125(Ti)-NH , leading to an increase in its photocatalytic activity. Characterization data indicate that plasma-treated materials retain most of their initial crystallinity, while exhibiting somewhat lower surface area and pore volume.

Bifunctional metal-organic frameworks for the hydrogenation of nitrophenol using methanol as the hydrogen source.

This work reports the reduction of 4-nitrophenol to 4-aminophenol using UiO-66(Zr) as a bifunctional photocatalyst and hydrogenation catalyst using methanol as the hydrogen source. In particular, a series of UiO-66(Zr)-X (X: NH, NO and H) and MIL-125(Ti)-NH catalysts have been screened as bifunctional catalysts for this process. UiO-66(Zr)-NH was found to be the most active material to promote light-assisted nitro hydrogenation under both UV-Vis and simulated sunlight irradiation.