Quantum heat treatment reshapes metal frameworks, avoiding decomposition

Researchers have demonstrated a new method for reshaping metal-organic framework glasses without decomposition, utilizing the chelating ligand 1,10-phenanthroline as an organic flux and ligand. This process lowers the glass transition temperature of selected MOFs and enables control over both local coordination and global topology, a level of structural control not readily achievable in conventional glasses. In systems, phenanthroline increases the coordination number at metal nodes and reduces network connectivity by forming terminal ligands. Crucially, the lower processing temperature suppresses thermal decomposition, enabling the synthesis of MOF glasses free of magnetic impurities and exhibiting antiferromagnetic coupling. Metal-organic frameworks, or MOFs, can now be reshaped without fracturing, thanks to a newly demonstrated process utilizing 1,10-phenanthroline as an organic flux and…