Effective aperture tuning of a zeolitic-imidazole framework CdIF-1 by controlled thermal amorphization

Sodalite zeolitic-imidazole frameworks (ZIFs) show great potential due to their effective aperture sizes suitable for small gas separations. Numerous efforts have, therefore, been made in tuning their effective aperture sizes to control and enhance their molecular sieving properties. Herein, we present a new strategy to finely tune the effective aperture size of CdIF-1, a cadmium-substituted ZIF-8 analogue, based on thermal amorphization. Among several ZIF-8 analogues screened, CdIF-1 was found to be the only one that could be thermally amorphized. The controlled amorphization reduced the long-range structural order while preserving the short-range order, thereby systematically densifying the ZIF structure and consequently affecting its effective aperture. Meanwhile, it was found that amorphization enhanced the flexibility of the framework, resulting in accessible pores at temperatures above 273 K. As compared to its crystalline counterpart, partially amorphized CdIF-1 showed significantly improved diffusion and adsorption selectivities of n-C4H10/i-C4H10 (i.e., 1.5 → 40.7 and 1.1 → 4.9, respectively), likely due to the amorphization-induced tuning of its effective aperture size.