Metal-Organic Frameworks as the Future for Environmental Science
(Susumu Kitagawa, Richard Robson, and Omar Yaghi, CNN)
Environmental concerns regarding climate change are at the forefront of science and our future, what if someone told you chemicals contributing to this phenomena could be grabbed right out of the air! Sounds pretty good right? As documented in the CNN article Nobel Prize in chemistry goes to scientist trio for Harry Potter-like work in molecular architecture, the 2025 Nobel laureates, Susumu Kitagawa, Richard Robson, and Omar Yaghi, have opened up many avenues for removing problematic chemicals, harvesting water from the air, and catalyzing reactions in a very unique way.
Metal-organic frameworks (MOFs) are carbon based crystalline structures created with a positively charged atom such as copper ions and a complementary chemical group attracted to said ions, for example a nitrile group. Making these structures with "arms" allows for the formation of cavities in which the amazing functionality of MOFs originates.
The uniquely created structure's cavities were first utilized in 1997 when Kitagawa made a breakthrough from developing a molecule that could not only absorb methane, nitrogen, and oxygen but also release it! Remarkably, Kim Jelfs, professor of chemistry at Imperial College London, said, "one gram of a MOF material can have the same surface area inside its pores as a football pitch", hence Heiner Linke, chair of the committee for chemistry, dubbing these compounds akin to "Hermione's handbag" from the Harry Potter novels. Additionally, these molecules have very impressive stability. Take MOF-5 for example, known a classic molecule in the field, that has Zn2+ nodes linked by benzene-1,4-dicarboxylate (BDC), which even as an empty structure can be heated to 300 degrees Celsius without collapsing!
(Image from the official Nobel Prize X account)
The uniquely created structure's cavities were first utilized in 1997 when Kitagawa made a breakthrough from developing a molecule that could not only absorb methane, nitrogen, and oxygen but also release it! Remarkably, Kim Jelfs, professor of chemistry at Imperial College London, said, "one gram of a MOF material can have the same surface area inside its pores as a football pitch", hence Heiner Linke, chair of the committee for chemistry, dubbing these compounds akin to "Hermione's handbag" from the Harry Potter novels. Additionally, these molecules have very impressive stability. Take MOF-5 for example, known a classic molecule in the field, that has Zn2+ nodes linked by benzene-1,4-dicarboxylate (BDC), which even as an empty structure can be heated to 300 degrees Celsius without collapsing!
(MOF-5, image from Wikipedia).
In terms of practical use, MOFs have already been used by Yaghi's research group to pull water from the desert air of Arizona. How does this happen? MOF's absorb compounds primarily through, van der Waals forces, electrostatic attractions, and hydrogen bonding to later be displaced out of the MOF via changes in pressure, temperature, pH, or by introducing more molecules to displace trapped compounds.
Great hope is held in the many climate change and chemical reaction applications that could benefit from these compounds. Only time will tell what spells these magical compounds will cast to improve the world.
References:
https://www.cnn.com/2025/10/08/science/nobel-prize-chemistry-intl
https://x.com/NobelPrize/status/1975861353907695717/photo/1
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MOF-5
