One-pot solvothermal synthesis of In-doped amino-functionalized UiO-66 Zr-MOFs with enhanced ligand-to-metal charge transfer for efficient visible-light-driven CO reduction.

Metal organic frameworks (MOFs) with high porosity and highly tunable physical/chemical properties can serve as heterogeneous catalysts for CO photoreduction, but the application is hindered by the large band gap (E) and insufficient ligand-to-metal charge transfer (LMCT). In this study, a simple one-pot solvothermal strategy is proposed to prepare an amino-functionalized MOF (aU(Zr/In)) featuring an amino-functionalizing ligand linker and In-doped Zr-oxo clusters, which enables efficient CO reduction driven with visible light. The amino functionalization leads to a significant reduction of E as well as a charge redistribution of the framework, allowing the absorption of visible light and the efficient separation of photogenerated carriers.