Equipment and Materials ♦ news digest
multi-functional organic molecules (linkers) and metal ions into a 3D network. The well-defined, highly-ordered, and readily-controlled structure of MOFs can be exploited in a diverse range of applications including gas storage, separations, catalysis, sensors and drug delivery. The presence of modifiable organic linkers in the MOF structure enables tunability of function and customisation of end use.
Current routes to MOF materials typically rely on solution-based processes in which the organic linker and the metal source – a metal salt, carbonate or oxide - are partially or fully dissolved in an appropriate solvent and reacted. The reaction can occur in a tightly closed vessel at high temperature or by subjecting the solution to microwaves, ultrasound or electrochemical treatment.
Metal-organic framework materials can a liquid, which can be included as an additive with the initial solid-phase reaction mixture or generated in situ as a byproduct during the milling process. Although often asserted to be “solid-state,” such processes necessarily involve liquid components, which can act as liquid micro-reactors that control the reaction process and promote the formation of MOFs by the conventional solution-based mechanism.
Until the discovery, it was uncertain whether MOF materials could be prepared in a completely liquid- free environment and whether new types of MOF materials and MOF materials of the purity required for many high-tech applications could be prepared in a cost-effective process.
“Excluding liquids from the preparation finally opens the way to making MOF materials whose properties are not influenced by the presence of contaminants and, therefore, may be quite different from those of conventional MOFs. Our approach also avoids the use of solvents, which are often harmful to the environment, difficult to remove from the extended 3D networks of the targeted MOF product materials, and detrimental to the performance of MOF materials in many applications,” says Viktor Balema, Manager of the Aldrich Hard Materials Centre of Excellence.
Balema further notes that “Aldrich’s process should enable generation of unique hybrid structures with non-conventional properties applicable in numerous areas of modern science and technology, which
extend from energy generation and storage to electronics and bio-technology.”
Prior to journal publication, Aldrich Materials Science filed a provisional patent application for the newly discovered procedure with the US Patent Office.
“This discovery exemplifies the work being done at the Hard Materials Centre of Excellence. Through this Centre along with the Polymer Centre of Excellence, we seek to enable innovation through new product additions to our materials portfolio, collaborations, technology licensing, custom research, process development and scale-up,” comments Shashi Jasty, Director, Aldrich Materials Science.
Vienna University orders Riber MBE reactors
The reactors will be used for compound semiconductor microelectronics and optoelectronics research
Riber has sold two Compact 21 MBE machines to Vienna University of Technology, a material research laboratory in Europe.
The Compact 21 - 3 ‘’ wafer systems are designed for the research on compound semiconductors for microelectronics or optoelectronics. MBE growth technology was selected as this platform is perfectly optimised when top performances of complex semiconductor heterostructures are needed.
These two new systems will enable Vienna University of Technology to increase his research capacities on new III-V and metal based structures. To extent the research capabilities and to grow ‘’incompatible’’ material structures, the two MBE systems are connected together to maintain a full UHV environment all along the MBE processes.
Riber designs and produces MBE systems as well as evaporation sources and cells for the semiconductor industry. This high-technology equipment is essential for the manufacturing of compound semiconductor materials and new materials that are used in numerous consumer applications, such as new information technologies,
January/February 2013
www.compoundsemiconductor.net 209
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