Single-crystal X-ray diffraction studies on structural transformations of porous coordination polymers

Chem Soc Rev. 2014 Aug 21;43(16):5789-814. doi: 10.1039/c4cs00129j.

Abstract

X-Ray single-crystal diffraction has been the most straightforward and important technique in structural determination of crystalline materials for understanding their structure-property relationships. This powerful tool can be used to directly visualize the precise and detailed structural information of porous coordination polymers or metal-organic frameworks at different states, which are unique for their flexible host frameworks compared with conventional adsorbents. With a series of selected recent examples, this review gives a brief overview of single-crystal X-ray diffraction studies and single-crystal to single-crystal transformations of porous coordination polymers under various chemical and physical stimuli such as solvent and gas sorption/desorption/exchange, chemical reaction and temperature change.