ChatLiquid battery electrolytes risk explosive fires when punctured; solid ceramic conductors crack under repetitive charge cycles. By blending flexible metal-organic frameworks into conductive solid glasses, chemical engineers have created non-flammable solid electrolytes that shuttle ions as fast as liquid solvents.
Hampered by the catastrophic fire risks of flammable liquid electrolytes in modern lithium-ion packs, and frustrated by brittle solid-state ceramics that fracture under mechanical expansion, the electric vehicle revolution faces a safety wall. Solid batteries have historically suffered from sluggish ion mobility at room temperature.
Materials chemists broke through this limitation by melting metal-organic framework crystals into disordered conductive glass. The glassy matrix behaves like a solid highway network with microscopic open tunnels, allowing lithium ions to slide freely through solid matter without liquid solvents.
This non-flammable solid glass prevents explosive short-circuits and doubles energy density. By eliminating thermal runaway risks, by extending electric vehicle range, and by enabling ten-minute fast charging, framework glasses power the next generation of safe batteries.
Alkali-ion-modified zeolitic imidazolate framework glasses
Modifying glass compositions is key to creating silicate-based glasses for technologies including optical fibres, catalytic supports, protective coatings and separation membranes. Here we extend this concept to metal–organic framework (MOF) glasses by modifying the MOF glass former ZIF-62 with Li(bim) and Na(bim) as compatible glass modifiers (benzimidazolate, bim−). Melt-quenching of physical mixtures with increasing Na(bim) content yields modified MOF glasses that exhibit a systematic decrease in the glass transition temperature (Tg), accompanied by increased liquid fragility, configurational heat capacity at Tg and density: paralleling silicate glass chemistry through partial network depolymerization. Structural and spectroscopic analysis, coupled with density-functional theory calculations, confirm that Na(bim) is incorporated homogeneously into the MOF glass framework rather than the pores and reveal the presence of undercoordinated sodium ion environments. Finally, extraction of the modifier by water treatment increases glass porosity, akin to established borosilicate glass processes. This work introduces a transferable approach for tailoring the structure and properties of MOF glasses. The properties of metal–organic framework glasses can be modulated by additives, but understanding how they modify the glass network is challenging. Now, alkali-modifier sites in MOF glasses have been identified, and the impact of both modifier content and identity on the processing temperatures and hierarchical porosity has been examined.
Simulating electronic structures of complex molecules historically stalled under crushing computational scaling bottlenecks; ORCA 5.0 unlocks multi-scale quantum chemistry through domain-based pair natural orbitals and ultra-fast linear-scaling solvers.
Traditional porous minerals like zeolites were limited by rigid silicon geometries; Bernard Hoskins and Richard Robson envisioned infinite crystalline lattices built from modular metal nodes and organic struts. Ignored for a decade as an impractical chemical oddity, this 1990 paper provided the structural foundation for modern metal-organic frameworks that trap carbon directly from thin air.
Silicon solar panels require expensive, energy-intensive cleanrooms and high-temperature furnaces; hybrid organic-inorganic perovskites absorb light across the entire solar spectrum and can be printed like ink. Published in 1978 as a basic crystallographic record, Dieter Weber’s hybrid crystal is now the fastest-advancing solar technology in history.
Fuel cell catalyst development focused almost exclusively on transition metal coordination centers; this surface chemistry study proves that non-coordinated edge carbon sites drive surprisingly high oxygen reduction reaction activity.
Chemical reactions traditionally required thousands of liters of toxic liquid solvents to bring molecules into contact; mechanical ball-milling generates sheer physical force that triggers self-accelerating autocatalysis in completely dry reaction mixtures.
Mechanical scotch-tape peeling produces only microscopic flakes of pristine graphene; William Hummers’ 1958 chemical recipe exfoliates bulk graphite into tons of water-dispersible two-dimensional sheets. Dormant for nearly half a century, "Hummers' Method" is now the indispensable global manufacturing route for 2D water-purification membranes and conductive composites.
Theoretical physics predicted that glass and steel should withstand millions of pounds of pressure; Alan Arnold Griffith proved that microscopic surface scratches focus mechanical stress into catastrophic fractures. Published in 1921, Griffith’s energy balance theorem founded the discipline of fracture mechanics, explaining why Liberty Ships snapped in half during World War II and teaching modern engineers how to build shatter-proof materials.
Building peptides in liquid solution required painstaking, months-long crystallization after every single amino acid addition; Bruce Merrifield anchored growing peptide chains to insoluble plastic beads, allowing unreacted chemicals to be washed away in seconds. This ingenious solid-phase paradigm automated the chemical assembly of proteins and laid the foundation for modern peptide therapeutics like GLP-1 weight-loss drugs.
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