The Nanoporous Materials Genome in Action

It is now possible to make an enormous spectrum of different nonporous materials simply by changing the building blocks in the synthesis of Metal Organic Frameworks (MOFs) or related materials. This unique chemical tune-ability allows us to tailor-make materials that are optimal for a given application. The promise of finding just the right material seems remote however: because of practical imitations, we can only ever synthesise, characterise and test a tiny fraction of all possible materials. To take full advantage of this development, therefore, we need to develop alternative techniques, collectively referred to as Materials Genomics, to rapidly screen large numbers of materials and obtain fundamental insights into the chemical nature of the ideal material for a given application. In this lecture we illustrate this approach by suggesting how to obtain optimal materials for gas separations and gas storage.