Isoreticular MOFs based on a rhombic dodecahedral MOP as a tertiary building unit

Abstract

The solvothermal reactions of a Zn(ii) ion with ligands containing two 1,3-benzene dicarboxylate residues linked via bent organic linkers with different flexibilities resulted in the isoreticular metal-organic frameworks (MOFs) PMOF-4 and PMOF-5 based on a rhombic dodecahedral metal-organic polyhedron (MOP) as a tertiary building unit (TBU). The rhombic dodecahedral MOP was built using six [Zn2(COO)4] clusters as a 4-c secondary building unit (SBU) and eight [Zn2(COO)3] clusters as a 3-c SBU. The network of the isoreticular MOFs based on the rhombic dodecahedral Zn-MOP is a 3,3,4-c net with a zjz topology, which is different from those of similar MOFs, PMOF-3 and PCN-12, based on a cuboctahedral Cu-MOP as a 24-c TBU. However, both 24-c TBUs in all MOFs were quadruply interlinked to six neighboring TBUs to form the same underlying pcu topology.