Exploration of Intrinsic Lipase-Like Activity of Zirconium-Based Metal-Organic Frameworks

To overcome the disadvantages of natural enzymes, artificial enzyme mimics attracted increasing attention of researchers. Metal-organic frameworks (MOFs) are expected as one of the most appropriate candidates for artificial enzyme mimics. In this work, we demonstrate that the zirconium-based MOF material UiO-66 and its analogues possess intrinsic lipase-like activity and can efficiently catalyze ester hydrolysis, transesterification and esterification reactions. Furthermore, the UiO-66(NH2) exhibits much higher catalytic activity than that of UiO-66, which can be attributed to the synergy effect between the zirconium cluster centres and the amino moieties during the catalytic cycle.