Leveraging Surface Chemistry and Pore Shape Engineering in a Metal‐Organic Framework for One‐Step Olefin Purification
Xin Lian, Puxu Liu, Yue‐Chao Yuan, Jing‐Jing Pang, Lin Li, Shanshan Liu, Bin Yue, Ying‐Hui Zhang, Libo Li, Jian Xu, Xian‐He Bu
Abstract
Abstract Purifying olefin from ternary paraffin/olefin/alkyne mixtures through a one‐step adsorption process is extremely desirable. Herein, a stable zirconium(IV) metal‐organic framework with a customized pore surface composed of nonpolar phenyl and slightly polar thiophene rings is reported to access the adsorption preference of paraffin and alkyne over olefin. Noteworthily, this material displays a superior ability to discriminate C 3 hydrocarbon molecules, which is principally more challenging compared with C 2 ones and rarely documented. Computational studies disclose that its featured pore shape fits well with C 3 gas molecules, enabling them to get close contact with the immobilized affinity sites. Leveraging surface chemistry and pore shape engineering synergistically gives rise to excellent C 3 adsorption capacities (>5 mmol g −1 ) and concurrently high C 3 H 8 /C 3 H 6 (1.4) and C 3 H 4 /C 3 H 6 (1.9) selectivities (at 298 K and 1 atm). Dynamic column breakthrough experiments demonstrate that one‐step purification of C 2 H 4 and C 3 H 6 can be simultaneously realized on this material.