Incorporating metal–organic frameworks into substrates for environmental applications

Over these years, metal organic framework (MOF), an emerging type of hybrid inorganic–organic crystal with ultrahigh porosity and wide tunability, has showed its significant potential for environmental remediation. However, traditional MOF crystals usually appear in the powder form due to the intrinsic brittleness, insolubility, and non-thermoplastic property, greatly limiting their practical applications. In this regard, growing attentions are concentrated on incorporating MOFs into substrates to obtain various MOF/Substrate composites, which not only inherit the advantageous features of MOF crystals, but also gain hierarchical porous structures from substrates, resulting in satisfactory environmental remediation performance and operational flexibility. A comprehensive review of recent developments in MOF/Substrate composites from fabrication methods to environmental applications is provided. Over five fabrication methods of MOF/Substrate composites and their applications in water decontamination, particulate matters filtration, harmful gases removal and bacterial inactivation are discussed. Moreover, this review also summarizes the underlying mechanisms of above processes in the hope of providing some useful principles and strategies to design specific MOF/Substrate composites. Finally, the future challenges and perspectives of versatile MOF/Substrate composites in the field of environmental remediation are proposed.