GAM-7: an organic-inorganic hybrid layered aluminophosphate crystal formed by zeolite transformation

The interzeolite conversion (IZC) of metallo- and aluminophosphate zeolites was demonstrated using a non-cyclic secondary amine, diisopropylamine, as the organic structure-directing agent (OSDA). The IZC of AlPO₄-5 with AFI topology could successfully produce an unknown highly crystalline phase, named GAM-7. In metallo-aluminophosphates (metal-AlPOs), SAPO-5 with a small amount of SiO₂ was also interconverted to a single crystal GAM-7, designated as [Si]GAM-7. However, in other metal-AlPOs, the corresponding GAM-7 crystals were formed as either an intermediate or a mixture of plural crystals. Additionally, it was found that GAM-7 could also be obtained by hydrothermal synthesis (HTS), but not synthesized from a silico-aluminophosphate hydrogel, indicating that [Si]GAM-7 can be prepared by only the IZC technique. The obtained GAM-7 crystal was well-characterized to elucidate the framework structure, and this revealed that GAM-7 was a new organic-inorganic hybrid layered aluminophosphate having a terminal POH group in the corrugated layered sheets, and the OSDA molecule between the layers was robustly interacting with an acidic POH site by a hydrogen bond. Furthermore, we have performed the tracking of pH values during the transformation from AlPO₄-5 into GAM-7 and have argued a reasonable consideration for the IZC process.