Probing Molecular Motions in Metal–Organic Frameworks by Three-Dimensional Electron Diffraction
Laura Samperisi, Aleksander Jaworski, Gurpreet Kaur, Karl Petter Lillerud, Xiaodong Zou, Zhehao Huang
Abstract
determination of their framework structures, we discovered that motions of the linker molecules could be revealed by observing the thermal ellipsoid models and analyzing the atomic anisotropic displacement parameters (ADPs) at room temperature (298 K) and cryogenic temperature (98 K). Interestingly, despite the same type of linker molecule occupying two symmetry-independent positions in MIL-140C, we observed significantly larger motions for the isolated linkers in comparison to those reinforced by π-π stacking. With an accuracy comparable to that of SCXRD, we show for the first time that 3D ED can be a powerful tool to investigate dynamics at an atomic level, which is particularly beneficial for nanocrystalline materials and/or phase mixtures.