Unit cell evolution of hydrophobic MOF under medium water pressure

Hydrophobic porous materials are potential candidates for energy storage. ZIF-8 and ZIF-71 were listed among the first candidates for storing mechanical energy by means of the pΔV work (p - pressure of intrusion, ΔV - volume of the pores filled by the liquid). Our recent studies on ZIF-8 revealed that the flexibility of the lattice is a crucial factor in determining other properties of the material like the intrusion pressure and the size of the hysteresis. Additionally, the quality of the sample turned out to be important in determining stability under applied water pressure.
Unfortunately, the intrusion pressure of ZIF-71 at 70 MPa is above many sample environments, therefore out initial structural studies were carried out only in the pre-intrusion region. The new setup available at the SNBL, which could potentially reach 100 MPa, will be used to overcome this obstacle and complete the study.