Research Associate Masataka Otani's research image appeared on the cover of "CrystEngComm2016".

A research image of Research Associate Masataka Otani and Professor Kazuya Kobiro was adopted as a cover picture of "CrystEngComm2016" of Royal Society of Chemistry, UK.

In their paper, they have demonstrated the macroscopic growth of a millimeter-long metal-organic framework (MOF) fiber. This fiber structure was unexpectedly found via the solvent vaporization process of a dispersion of a Zn-based MOF crystal. In-depth experiments reveal that a humid environment is a key to understand the growth mechanism of the fiber structure. Synchrotron X-ray single-crystal diffraction analysis at SPring-8 (BL40XU and BL02B2) reveals that the complete crystal transformation from the MOF sheet to MOF fiber is accompanied by water coordination and ligand rearrangement. The highly anisotropic MOF fiber is easily converted to an electro-conductive fiber while maintaining the long-fiber morphology. This finding attracts much attention not only as a synthetic method for a new nanofiber structure but also for developing a new electroconductive nanomaterial having highly structural anisotropy.

Title: Water-triggered macroscopic structural transformation of a metal-organic framework
Authors: Research Associate Masataka Ohtani and Prof. Kazuya Kobiro, School of Environmental Science and Engineering