Catalysts are philosopher's stone of the chemical industry as about 85% of the processes require a catalyst at least in one step during their production. They have recently found applications in generating and storing renewable energy, green chemicals synthesis, and environmental remediation. Also, catalysts are envisaged to play a pivotal role in realizing biorefinery and hydrogen economy concepts. Therefore, the development of efficient, robust, selective, economic, and environmentally benign catalysts is highly relevant.
The present research focuses on developing cost-effective catalysts based on metal-organic frameworks (MOFs) and derived materials. MOFs—crystalline nanoporous materials—possess high specific surface area, tunable pore size, and dynamic redox features. Additionally, these materials can be engineered for exciting applications in heterogeneous catalysis via pre-synthetic and post-synthetic modifications. The current thesis centers on the chemical modification at the nodes and linkers to convert inactive MOFs to highly efficient and multifunctional catalysts. For instance, incorporation of different divalent metals (Co, Ni) in the framework of monometallic (Fe) MOF or addition of basic (-NH2, -OH) functionality at the ligand generated catalysts with improved catalytic activity. Additionally, through controlled thermal decomposition, the morphology and surface area of MOFs can be transformed into catalytically active nanostructured materials. Engineered MOFs catalyzed oxidation, reduction, dehydrogenation, hydrogen evolution reaction (HER), and oxygen evolution reaction (OER).