Lanthanide post-functionalized UiO-67 type metal–organic frameworks for tunable light-emission and stable multi-sensors in aqueous media

Abstract As well known, Zr-based UiO-type MOFs exhibit extraordinary high thermal and chemical stability, making them excellent candidates for new kinds of host materials. In this work, A UiO-67 type MOF (UiO-67-PO) has been successfully synthesized based on a lanthanide-affinity pyridin-4(1H)-one decorated dicarboxylate ligand. Post-functionalization with Tb3+ and Eu3+ (Tb1-x/Eux@UiO-67-PO, x = 0 to 1.0) afforded tunable green ↔ yellow ↔ red light-emitting materials. Tb@UiO-67-PO shows strong luminescence and water stability, which can be served as an efficient multi-sensor for detection of aniline, Cr2O72− and Fe3+ ions in aqueous solution with low detection limit of 60.11, 0.33 and 12.69 µM, respectively. This study displays the advantages of combining luminescent lanthanide ions with robust UiO-type MOFs in tuning the fluorescence and sensing performance.