Modulation of Electrical and Thermal Conductivity in Metal-Organic Framework by Conducting Polymer

Abstract

Metal-Organic Frameworks (MOFs) are well explored candidates in numerous fields such as gas storage, separation, sensing and more, however, most of them are intrinsically insulating in nature, due to which they lag behind in the domain of energy storage devices. Herein, we have assembled polypyrrole chains inside the nanochannels of a Zr-based framework (UiO-66) leading to a million fold electrical conductivity enhancement with a value of ~10-2 S/cm for UiO-66_PPy, at the minimal cost of porosity loss. Notably, at the same time, thermal conductivity increment in the nanocomposite is not huge, which is usually unavoidable where electrical conductivity and thermal conductivity cooperatively reforms. The nanocomposite was then tested for supercapacitor performance and revealed a value of 130mF/cm2 at current density of 0.2 mA/cm2 with almost 100% retention of the value after 10k cycles.