Aging of the reaction mixture as a tool to modulate the crystallite size of UiO-66 into the low nanometer range

Nanosized UiO-66 with an unprecedented crystallite size of 10 nm was synthesized by exploiting controlled aging of stock solutions of Zr4+ in N,N-dimethylformamide in the presence of variable amounts of water and acetic acid prior to the addition of the ligand. The yield of the synthesis is not affected, affording high conversion of the starting reagents into the product.