Excitonic effect in MOFs-mediated photocatalysis: Phenomenon, characterization techniques and regulation strategies

Metal-organic frameworks (MOFs)-mediated photocatalysis provides a promising solution to energy shortage and environmental pollution. In the past few years, a large number of modification strategies for improving the photocatalytic performance of MOFs have been developed. Correspondingly, many profound photocatalytic mechanisms, such as the excitonic effect, have been proposed. The newly revealed excitonic effect plays a significant role in the formation of reactive species via either charge transfer or energy transfer. Thus, an up-to-date understanding of MOFs-mediated photocatalysis with the excitonic effect is highly needed. In this work, the excitonic effects in charge transfer and energy transfer processes were critically reviewed for the first time, covering a summary of common techniques for characterizing excitonic effect and mainstream strategies for regulating excitonic behaviors. In addition, the current challenges and future perspectives of MOFs-mediated photocatalysis for energy conversion and environmental remediation were discussed.