Chemical Sciences: Metal-organic frameworks capture CO2

A porous metal-organic framework that can absorb large amounts of carbon dioxide (CO2) at ambient conditions is reported in Nature Communications this week. This technology may open up new possibilities for the capture and separation of CO2 in industrial processes.

Metal-organic frameworks are highly porous materials that are promising for gas capture. A significant challenge to their more widespread use for capturing CO2 has been their inefficiency at ambient temperatures and pressures. Banglin Chen and colleagues present a metal-organic framework that overcomes this problem and displays a high uptake of CO2 at ambient conditions.

Because of their low cost and non-toxic nature, metal-organic frameworks could become viable alternatives to the solvents that are presently used to chemically absorb CO2 in industrial processes.