Luminescent metal-organic frameworks (LMOFs): An emerging sensing platform for food quality and safety control

Along with the intensification of global food supply, food security has become a fateful barrier throughout the global food trade and delivery. Reliable analytic techniques are in strong need to keep up with the continuous demand for food quality and safety monitoring. In this review, the current strategies for different fluorescence mechanisms of MOF-based sensors for food detection are classified and we highlight the construction strategy of MOFs to obtain high performance and multiple photonic function. In addition, recent applications of LMOFs in food safety analyzing as well as the typical sensing mechanisms are reviewed. Finally, we also outline the challenges in these fields and put forward the prospects for future development of LMOFs in food analysis. Fluorescent MOFs have been utilized as sensors to alleviate the food safety problems. The vast combination possibilities, synergistic effects, as well as controllable and ordered arrangements of multiple fluorescent units have distinguished MOFs from other analysis techniques and enabled them to be a promising platform for food quality and safety control. Reasonable crystal engineering principles offers MOFs with the structure–property correlations and varied fluorometric sensing properties, resulting in a rapidly increasing application in food safety.