A porous and interpenetrated metal-organic framework comprising tetranuclear ironIII-Oxo clusters and tripodal organic carboxylates and its implications for (3,8)-coordinated networks

A porous metal-organic framework (MOF), Fe-4(,mu(3)-O)(2)(BTB)(8/3)(DMF)(2)(H2O)(2)center dot(DMF)(10)(H2O)2 (1) (BTB = benzene1,3,5-tribenzoate, DMF = N,N-dimethylformamide) has two interpenetrating 3D frameworks composed of fused cages and shows a stronger affinity for CO2 than most other known highly porous MOFs. The unique tetranuclear iron-oxo clusters act as 8-connectors, which are linked by 3-connecting BTBs, to give a partially augmented the net (using the symbolism of O'Keeffe and co-workers). The underlying implications for (3,8)-coordinated networks are also discussed in relation to the framework structure of 1.