Metal-organic frameworks for wastewater treatment: Recent developments, challenges, and future prospects.

Wastewater treatment is critically important for the existence of life on earth; however, this approach involves the removal of toxic metal contaminants and organic pollutants, requiring efficient adsorbent materials. Within this agenda, metal-organic frameworks (MOFs) appear to be potential materials due to their unique properties as efficient adsorbents, effective photocatalysts, and reliable semi-permeable membranes. Therefore, MOFs have undergone various modifications over the years without desirable success to improve adsorption capacity, hydro-stability, reaction kinetics, and reusability. Therefore, scientists around the world got engaged in MOF research for novel modifications, including defect engineering, carbonization, and membrane fabrication, at the laboratory scale. This review focuses on developing MOF-based adsorbents, photocatalysts, and semi-permeable membranes for wastewater treatment since 2015, emphasizing their structural-functional relationships. Finally, the challenges and opportunities with MOFs in wastewater treatment are also underlined for future efforts.