Electronic, Structural and Functional Versatility in Tetrathiafulvalene-Lanthanide Metal-Organic Frameworks

Tetrathiafulvalene-Lanthanide (TTF-Ln) Metal-Organic Frameworks (MOFs) are an interesting class of multifunctional materials in which porosity can be combined with electronic properties such as electrical conductivity, redox activity, luminescence and magnetism. Herein we report a new family of isostructural TTF-Ln MOFs, denoted as MUV-5(Ln) (Ln = Gd, Tb, Dy, Ho, Er), exhibiting semiconducting properties as a consequence of the short intermolecular S···S contacts established along the chain direction between partially oxidised TTF moieties. In addition, this family shows photoluminescence properties and single-molecule magnetic behaviour, finding near-infrared (NIR) photoluminescence in the Yb/Er derivative and slow relaxation of the magnetisation in the Dy and Er derivatives. As such properties are dependent on the electronic structure of the lanthanide ion, we emphasise the immense structural, electronic and functional versatility of this class of materials.