A smorgasbord of separation strategies using microporous crystalline materials

Abstract

Ordered crystalline microporous materials such as zeolites, metal-organic frameworks and zeolitic imidazolate frameworks, with pores in the 3–20 Å range, offer considerable potential for use in a wide variety of separations in the process industries. For many separation tasks, microporous adsorbents and membranes are energy-efficient alternatives, or adjuncts, to conventional distillation technology. Molecular insights and molecular simulation techniques allow us to identify the microporous material with the ideal pore size that offers the right degree of interactions (such as van der Waals, electrostatic, π-electron exchange) with the guest molecules to achieve the best separation. Particularly noteworthy are possibilities of separations on the basis of subtle differences in molecular configurations, and the efficiencies with which molecules pack or stack within the microporous channels.