Engineering Porosity Through Defects in a Giant Pore Metal–Organic Framework

Defect engineering is a powerful tool that can be used to tailor the properties of metal–organic frameworks (MOFs). Here, we incorporate defects through ball milling to systematically vary the porosity of the giant pore MOF, MIL-100 (Fe). We show that milling leads to the breaking of metal–linker bonds, generating more coordinatively unsaturated metal sites, and ultimately causes amorphisation. Pair distribution function analysis shows the hierarchical local structure is partially

retained, even in the amorphised material. We find that the solvent toluene stabilises the MIL-100 (Fe) framework against collapse and leads to a substantial rentention of porosity over the non-stabilised material.