1 research outputs found
Morphogenesis of Metal–Organic Mesocrystals Mediated by Double Hydrophilic Block Copolymers
Mesocrystalsî—¸superstructures
of crystalline nanoparticles
that are aligned in a crystallographic fashionî—¸are of increasing
interest for formation of inorganic materials with complex and sophisticated
morphologies to tailor properties without changing chemical composition.
Here we report morphogenesis of a novel mesocrystal consisting of
nanoscale metal–organic frameworks (MOF) by using double hydrophilic
block copolymer (DHBC) as a crystal modulator. DHBC selectively prefers
the metastable hexagonal kinetic polymorph and promotes anisotropic
crystal growth to generate hexagonal rod mesocrystals via oriented
attachment and mesoscale assembly. The metastable nature of hexagonal
mesocrystals enables further hierarchical morphogenesis by a solvent-mediated
polymorphic transformation toward stable tetragonal mesocrystals that
retain the outer hexagonal particle morphology. Furthermore, synthesis
of hybrid MOFs, where hexagonal mesocrystals are vertically aligned
on specific surfaces of cubic MOFs, is demonstrated. The present strategy
opens a new avenue to create MOF mesocrystals and their hybrids with
controlled size and morphology that can be designed for various potential
applications