3.6 Large-scale synthesis and structural stability of MIL-120Al
For industrial application, the structural stability and scalable synthesis of the adsorbent also should be considered besides its adsorption performance. Figure S15 and S19a show the variable temperature PXRD patterns and corresponding 77 K N2adsorption isotherms, which reveal that MIL-120Al exhibits excellent thermal stability up to 523 K without any phase changes being observed. Furthermore, the chemical stability of MIL-120Al toward organic solvents and acid-base environments was also investigated (Figure S19b and Figure S19c). The framework of MIL-120Al was stable under extreme conditions for several hours, and no loss in its crystallinity and no phase changes were observed in PXRD and the 77 K N2 adsorption isotherms. In addition, when compared with the pristine material, the PXRD patterns remain unchanged after the adsorption and breakthrough tests, indicating its good test stability (Figure S19d). More importantly, MIL-120Al was easily synthesized from very common chemical commodities via a ’green’ and scalable method, in which the only solvent was water (Figures 8a, 8b). In addition, the almost consistent breakthrough curves observed for the large-scale sample with that of the laboratory-scale indicate that the scale-up synthesis does not have a negative effect on the separation properties of the material (Figure 8c).