Â鶹ÒùÔº

This year's Nobel Prize in Chemistry was awarded to three researchers, including University at Albany alum Omar Yaghi, for their work on developing metal-organic frameworks (MOFs)—versatile molecular materials that can be used to harvest water from desert air, capture carbon dioxide, store toxic gases and even catalyze chemical reactions.

UAlbany's Jeremy Feldblyum, associate professor of chemistry and director of graduate studies, is an expert in metal-organic frameworks, which he has been dedicated to studying for two decades.

While undertaking his Ph.D. at the University of Michigan, Feldblyum worked with Adam Matzger, who collaborated with Omar Yaghi and co-discovered methods to make metal-free framework materials that now show promise for applications in semiconductors and batteries, among other areas of science and technology.

Taking inspiration from his graduate and postdoctoral research, Feldblyum has explored ways to transform metal-organic frameworks into durable, high-performance materials for clean energy and sustainability. His team has looked at MOFs that can store electrical charge, conduct ions and selectively recover critical elements like lithium from battery waste. Uncovering how these materials function at the molecular level could lead to smarter, more sustainable solutions for energy storage, recycling and environmental protection.

We caught up with Feldblyum to learn about the importance of advancing research on metal-organic frameworks, his own work in this area, and the significance of this year's Nobel nod to researchers working in this field.

What are metal-organic frameworks (MOFs)?

Metal-organic frameworks are solids whose chemical structures resemble the steel frameworks from which skyscrapers are built. Much like those frames, MOFs serve as "blank slate" materials that can be customized for myriad functions ranging from purifying water to mimicking the chemistry performed by enzymes in our bodies.

How did you become interested in working on metal-organic frameworks?

I stumbled upon this area by chance. When I was a graduate student at the University of Michigan, I had an interest in solar cells but to fulfill some administrative requirements, I also needed to work in an area related to polymers. It just so happened that there was space in the laboratory of Adam Matzger, a pioneering figure in MOFs who worked with Yaghi during the early years of the development of these materials. After joining the lab, I was hooked. There is an artistry to making MOFs that I adore, and they hold tremendous potential for benefiting humanity.

What are the most promising applications for this technology?

Fundamentally, there isn't an area of science or technology where MOFs would be unable to play a role. The most promising directions are those where MOFs provide unparalleled advantages: energy-efficient separations and separations of rare and critical minerals, high-performance energy storage devices (for example, for those used in aeronautics and space), and medicine (drug delivery in particular).

What are you studying now?

Our lab examines many aspects of energy and materials security. Our work in MOFs focuses primarily on improving the battery supply chain and enabling fine chemical purification that has proven prohibitively difficult by other means. However, the interests in our research group are broad, and we are now exploring avenues ranging from food (for example, using these materials to alter food texture or deliver vitamins), to new phases of matter where MOFs can play a key role.

What does it mean to you for this research area to be recognized by a Nobel Prize?

When I began my graduate studies, I could not have conceived of just how ubiquitous MOFs would be in the scientific landscape. I am proud that I was able to make unique contributions in understanding MOF structure and behavior and am honored to be able to work in such an important field that has strong potential to impact our daily lives.

What excites you most about the future of this research area?

The future of MOFs is as limitless as the future of chemistry itself. I am constantly surprised by the new and innovative ways that scientists deploy these materials, and expect many more unexpected discoveries for using MOFs in ways that have yet to be demonstrated. These materials have the potential to improve the way we work with energy, materials and pharmaceuticals.

Thinking big picture, it is inspiring to consider the ways that science builds over time, including the scientific challenges that scientists had to overcome to get to where we are with metal-organic frameworks today. The awardees of this year's Nobel Prize in Chemistry—Susumu Kitagawa, Richard Robson and Omar Yaghi—pioneered many of the fundamental concepts chemists used to make and study MOFs.

Robson was the first to recognize how coordination chemistry—the field of chemistry concerned with reactivity between metal- and carbon-based species—could be used to rationally design and form three-dimensional MOFs from deliberately selected chemical building blocks. Kitagawa was among the first to show that the space within MOFs could be emptied without destroying the material, paving the way for their use in applications ranging from batteries to pollutant removal. Yaghi developed straightforward and robust methods to make MOFs that enabled their use by scientists and engineers in other fields. With his contributions, discoveries have been made in areas ranging from conductive MOFs to MOFs that find use in quantum computing.

Together, this work is laying the foundation for transformational advances in technologies for climate resiliency, biomedical breakthroughs and new enhanced materials for public good.