A chiral lanthanide metal–organic framework for selective sensing of Fe(iii) ions.

A new luminescent lanthanide metal–organic framework was synthesized under hydrothermal conditions by introducing the tetracarboxylic acid ligand (H₄bptc) as a chromophore to sensitize the luminescence of the Tb³⁺ ion. Interestingly, despite the achiral nature of H₄bptc, the resulting framework exhibited rare chiral helical channels. The luminescence studies revealed that this material showed a highly selective fluorescence quenching response to Fe³⁺ ions in liquid suspension, which can be conveniently observed by the naked eye under UV light. Thus, this material can be potentially used as a chemosensor for sensing Fe³⁺ ions and its selective luminescence quenching response can be explained in terms of the competitive absorption mechanism. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]