Innovation — new

A better building block for creating new materials Researchers describe a new way to synthesize organic “Legos,” a chemical framework that can be easily modified and controlled to create new materials with unique properties. A graphical representation of the covalent organic frameworks, or COFs, created by a collaborative team of experimental and theoretical chemists. Large porphyrin structures (labelled as TAPP) form an egg carton-like lattice that forms multiple stacks, with pyridine molecules (shown in blue) filling the spaces in between the layers. An electrical current is depicted in green. (Image: Felice Macera) When chemists or engineers want to make a new type...