Inaugural Lectures by Fellows/Associates

Porous Framework Materials: What are They Good For?

The speaker and his research team have successfully overcome the chemical stability problem of Covalent organic frameworks (COFs) by synthesizing β-ketoenamine based frameworks, while processability, synthetic hurdles, and scalability of COFs still remain unexplored. In order to address these key issues, they have developed a very simple, scalable and novel methodology by which COFs can be synthesized by simple mixing and heating of the reactants. Using this method, COF can be processed in to self-standing covalent organic framework membranes (COMs). The resultant COMs display higher porosity and crystallinity over their reported powder form. These selfstanding COMs are flexible, continuous, devoid of any internal defects or cracks, show long-term durability. They have utilized these COMs for separation applications such as waste water treatment and recovery of valuable active pharmaceutical ingredients [APIs] from organic solvents.