Dear Colleagues,

Over the last 15 years, a big effort has been devoted to the design of crystalline reticular 2D and 3D organic materials known as covalent organic frameworks (COFs). In parallel, strategies have been developed to isolate related amorphous materials, such as hyper-crosslinked polymers (HCPs), conjugated microporous polymers (CMPs) porous aromatic frameworks (PAFs), polymers of intrinsic microporosity (PIMs), and suprastructures with intrinsic microporosity (SIM). In general, all these materials have significant advantages: light weight, inherent porosity, excellent stability, and pre-designable/tunable structures and functions.

Among the applications of porous organic materials, catalysis stands out for its industrial and economic interest. In this context, this family of structures offers new opportunities because it allows the incorporation of complex molecular fragments into extended porous materials. Thus, the design of molecular catalysts can boost the development of catalytic porous organic materials that put together the best of both homogeneous and heterogeneous worlds. Catalytic centers present in COFs and related porous organic polymers can be of different nature: organic fragments, metal ions, nanoparticles, biomolecules, or even the extended framework structure can be catalytically active by itself. Therefore, catalysis of different kinds can be achieved using porous organic materials, such as organocatalysis, metal catalysis, biocatalysis, photocatalysis or electrocatalysis. The interest of these materials not only lays on the diversity of types of catalytic centers and transformations, but environment and confinement effects can also be exploited.

The available literature demonstrates the versatility of porous organic materials. Thus, the study of their catalytic applications is a blossoming field. Recently, the scope of reactions explored has significantly increased, approaching their full catalytic potential. Many challenges addressed at molecular systems are now being examined using COFs and related materials, such as asymmetric processes or cooperative multicomponent catalysis. In addition, examples of size discrimination phenomena or confinement effects are appearing in the literature. Fundamental findings focusing on concepts and results related to the use of organic porous materials as heterogeneous catalysts are the main topic of this Special Issue.

Prof. Dr. Rubén Mas Ballesté
Prof. Dr. José Alemán
Guest Editors

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• Covalent organic frameworks (COFs)
• Porous organic polymers (POPs)
• Covalent triazine frameworks (CTFS)
• Conjugated microporous polymers (CMPs)
• Porous aromatic frameworks (PAFs)
• Hiprecrosslinked polymers (HCPs)
• Polymers of intrinsic porosity (PIMs)
• Suprastructures with intrinsic microporosity (SIMs)
• Organocatalysis
• Metal catalysis
• Biocatalysis
• Photocatalysis
• Electrocatalysis
• Confined catalysis
• Multicomponent catalysis
• Asymmetric catalysis