Site-Selective Zn-Metalation in Poly-Triphenyl Amine-based Porous Organic Polymer for Solid-Gas Phase CO₂...

Harvesting solar energy to produce value-added chemicals from carbon dioxide (CO₂) presents a promising route for addressing the complexities of sustainable energy systems and environmental issues. In this context, the development of metal-coordinated porous organic polymers (POPs) offers a vital avenue for improving the photocatalytic performance of organic motifs. The current study presents a metal-integrated photocatalytic system (namely, Zn@BP-POP) developed via a one-pot Friedel-Crafts (F.C.) acylation strategy, for solid-gas phase photochemical CO₂ reduction to CO (CO₂RR). The postsynthetic incorporation of metal (Zn) active sites on the host polymeric backbone of BP-POP significantly influences the catalytic activity. Notably, Zn@BP-POP demonstrates good photocatalytic performance in the absence of any cocatalyst and photosensitizer yielding CO while impeding the competitive hydrogen evolution reaction (HER) from water. The experimental findings collectively propose that the observed catalytic activity and selectivity arise from the synergistic interplay between the singular zinc catalytic centers and the light-harvesting capacity of the highly conjugated polymeric backbone. Further, X-ray absorption spectroscopy (XAS) analysis has significantly highlighted the prominent role played by the ZnN₂O₄ single sites in the polymeric framework for activating the gaseous CO₂ molecules. Further, time-dependent density functional theory (DFT) analysis also reveals the thermodynamic feasibility of CO₂RR over HER under optimized reaction conditions. This work cumulatively presents an effective strategy to demonstrate the importance of metal-active sites and effectively establish their structure-activity relationship during photocatalysis.