Facile synthesis and characterization of Al-MOFs using benzene-1,3,5-tricarboxylic acid as a new class of materials for Far-UVC applications

In this study, a novel Al-MOFs was hydrothermally synthesized using organic linker (benzene-1,3,5-tricarboxylic acid, i.e. trimesic acid) because of its thermal and chemical stability as well as the versatile capability of Aluminum (Al) to form multifaceted structures. The material was targeted for applications in supercapacitor, energy storage, sensing and biomedical sciences like Far-UVC device applications. The morphological structure and bandgap of the Benzene Tricarboxylic Acid (BTC)-Aluminum based MOFs samples underwent characterization using a range of techniques, such as X-ray Diffraction (XRD) analysis, Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM), Energy Dispersive X-ray Spectroscopy (EDS), Raman spectroscopy, and UV-Vis spectroscopy. The XRD investigation confirmed the successful fabrication of MOF layered structure on Al-MOFs with an average crystallinity of 2.155nm. SEM identified the hexagonal structure of Al-MOFs nanocrystals and showed strong agglomeration with a grain size of 186nm. EDX analysis confirms the existence of aluminum peaks along with carbon peaks (as organic linkers), indicating the presence of organic linkers in the framework, which is the key component of MOF's porosity. The Raman spectroscopy results evidenced the synthesis of Al-MOFs structure. The optical bandgap was evaluated using UV-Vis spectrophotometry and estimated as Eg=5.48eV, indicating the materials stability for photovoltaic and some Far-UVC devices. Overall, the results suggest that the synthesized Al-MOFs nanomaterial is a promising candidate for various applications including Far-UVC device applications.