Fine-tuning of pore-space-partitioned metal-organic frameworks for efficient C2H2/C2H4 and C2H2/CO2 separation

Acetylene (C2H2) and ethylene (C2H4) both are important chemical raw materials and energy fuel gasses. But the effective removement of trace C2H2 from C2H4 and the purification of C2H2 from carbon dioxide (CO2) are particularly challenging in the petrochemical industry. As a class of porous physical adsorbent, metal-organic frameworks (MOFs) have exhibited great success in separation and purification of light hydrocarbon gas. Herein, we rationally designed four novel MOFs by the strategy of pore space partition (PSP) via introducing triangular tri(pyridin-4-yl)-amine (TPA) into the 1D hexagonal channels of acs-type parent skeleton. By modulating the functional groups of linear dicarboxylate linkers for the parent skeleton, a series of isoreticular PSP-MOFs (SNNU-278−281) were successfully obtained. The synergistic effects of suitable pore size and Lewis basic functional groups make these MOFs ideal C2H2 adsorbents. The gas adsorption experimental results show that all MOFs have excellent C2H2 uptakes. Specially, SNNU-278 demonstrates a high C2H2 uptake of 149.7 cm3/g at 273 K and 1 atm. Meanwhile, SNNU-278−281 MOFs also show extremely great C2H2 separation from CO2 and C2H4. The optimized SNNU-281 with high-density hydroxy groups exhibits extraordinary C2H2/CO2 and C2H2/C2H4 dynamic breakthrough interval times up to 31 min/g and 17 min/g under 298 K and 1 bar.