Cyclic Trinuclear Units Based Covalent Metal‐Organic Frameworks for Gold Recovery

Abstract

The development of porous solids for gold recovery is highly desired from both an economical and environmental point of view, however the design of solid adsorbents with high overall performance is still challenging. Herein, we designed three copper(I) cyclic trinuclear units, Cu(I)‐CTUs, based covalent metal‐organic frameworks (CMOFs) by networking metal clusters with dynamic covalent linkages. These CMOFs deliver a high gold adsorption capacity of 3687 mg g−1, ultra‐fast adsorption kinetics (i.e., removal efficiency > 99% within 20s), excellent selectivity and reusability. In addition, it can be readily used for gold extraction from e‐waste. Owing to the rich redox properties of Cu‐CTUs, these CMOFs show three sorption mechanisms including adsorption, chemical reduction and photocatalytic reduction. Interestingly, the gold‐loaded CMOFs can be used as catalysts for hydration of alkynes to ketones with high yields (e.g., up to ~ 95% for 6 examples).