Oriented Assembly of Copper Metal-Organic Frameworks Membranes as Tandem Catalysts to Enhance C-H Hydroxyalkynylation Reactions with Regiocontrol

Constructing well-organized metal-organic frameworks (MOFs) membranes with a uniform and continuous nanoarchitecture is an effective strategy for the functionalization of MOFs-based heterogeneous catalysts. In this work, by employing surfactant PVA (poly(vinyl alcohol)) as a soft-template, a moderate synthetic approach was adopted to possess Cu-MOF (1, [Cu(BBDC)(azobpy)(H2O)]n, H2BBDC = 4'-benzoyl-(1,1'-biphenyl)-3,5-dicarboxylic acid, azobpy = 4,4′-azopyridine) for building highly ordered Cu-MOF membranes (1a) with good control of the morphology and thickness on the surface of macroporous Cu foam, which could facilitate the growth of the homogeneous and high-quality Cu-MOF membranes. Furthermore, the catalytic performance of Cu-MOF membranes 1a was superior to that of large size of 1 for tandem three-component C-H hydroxyalkynylation reactions, because the Cu-MOF membranes could afford a functionalized and tunable platform with benefit of readily accessible active sites to promote tandem reactions by minimizing the diffusion distance but did little for their regioselectivity.