Recent Advances in Synthesis and Applications of Functional Rare-Earth Metal-Organic Frameworks

Metal-organic frameworks (MOFs) have garnered significant attention over the past few decades due to their diverse chemical architectures and tunable physicochemical properties, culminating in the award of the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 2025. By integrating various metal nodes with organic linkers, MOFs offer extensive opportunities for rational design, controlled synthesis, and multifunctional applications. From structural and functional perspectives, MOFs incorporating rare earth (RE) elements (such as scandium, yttrium, and the 15 lanthanides) constitute a distinct subclass of MOFs. The structural diversity of RE metal-organic frameworks (RE-MOFs) is intrinsically correlated with their unique functional characteristics, which primarily stem from the precise selection of metal centers and the deliberate design of organic ligands. This review presents a systematic overview of the synthetic strategies for RE-MOFs, emphasizing the design and roles of metal nodes and ligand structures, and provides a comprehensive summary of their current applications in detecting volatile organic compounds, small molecules, cations, anions, biomarkers, and temperature, as well as in optical encoding and anti-counterfeiting technologies, and rare eart separation.