A Review of the Current Progress of Metal-organic Framework and Covalent Organic Framework Nanocomposite Membrane in O2/N2 Gas Separation

The use of membrane technology has developed rapidly since the proposal of the Robeson upper bound. Nevertheless, the researchers proposed various methods and techniques to enhance the permeability and selectivity to achieve a breakthrough of the upper bound. Metal-organic framework (MOF) and covalent organic framework (COF) were the recently-interest- arising materials enhancing gas separation performance. In this study, recent advances in MOF and COF were comprehensively discussed in terms of the materials, properties and synthesis method. Later, the MOF and COF nanocomposite mixed matrix membrane development was discussed to evaluate the recent improvement of these membranes used in the O2/N2 gas separation performance. This work intends to overview the recent progress and development of the metal-organic framework, covalent organic frameworks and the used nanocomposite membrane in O2/N2 gas separation. This topic review was carried out from a thorough literature review of metal-organic frameworks, covalent organic frameworks and the used nanocomposite membrane in O2/N2 gas separation. Additionally, the recent achievement of the O2/N2 gas separation by nanocomposite membrane in term of permeability and selectivity are also discussed. Findings from this study suggested that MOF and COF-based nanocomposite membranes could be used in either the O2/N2 and N2/O2 gas separation process with the possibility of being involved in the gas production sector.