Timothée’s ChemSusChem paper demonstrates how the superior adsorptive properties of porous and crystalline metal-organic framework (MOFs) offer novel and sustainable alternatives for the recovery of biobased fermentative products. This paper resulted from a collaboration with the De Vos group, Stock group (CAU, DE) Bein group (LMU, DE).

Many thanks to the European Research Council for awarding Rob's starting grant project VAPORE!

In this paper we try to highlight the underlying concepts of vapor phase growth of MOFs and which exciting perspectives this MOF-CVD approach opens.

BBC show The Naked Scientists highlights the work on MOF-based sensors in a radio interview with Rob.

Our work on MOF-based sensors for the detection of nerve agents sparked a lot of interest, from within the academic community but as well from the broader public and some companies! In the future we will build on this work to develop sensors for (1) indoor air quality monitoring, (2) medical diagnosis based on breath analysis and (3) monitoring the evolution of complex aromas (e.g. ripening of fruit, detecting the freshness of meat, etc.)

Ivo's paper on the detection of nerve agents with MOFs has been published in Chemical Science. Congrats! In this work it is show how non-conductive MOFs such as UiO-type frameworks can be used for the ppb-level detection of toxic organic compounds. In the future we will combine this approach with our patented MOF-CVD concept to enable the scalable production of highly sensitive and miniaturized sensors.

Ivo was awarded his PhD after successfully completing the public defense of his thesis: "Synthesis of immobilized metal-organic frameworks for integrated applications

Joris' review on the use and production of ionic liquids has been published in ACS Sustainable Chemistry & Engineering. This paper resulted from a collaboration with the De Vos group and the Binnemans group.

Min Tu will join the group on May 1, 2016. Min is originally from China and recently completed his PhD at the Ruhr-Universität Bochum under the supervision of Prof. Roland Fischer (now at TU Munich). Min published many papers on the thin film growth of metal-organic frameworks, especially ZIFs, and how to study the adsorption properties of these materials using quartz crystal microbalance techniques. In our group, Min will focus on using the this film growth of luminescent host-guest MOF composites, based on MOF-CVD. Min will be supported by a prestigious MSCA fellowship. Congratulations and welcome Min!

Our work on vapor deposition of MOFs receives plenty of online and offline attention