Catalytic "mOF-Cloth" Formed via Directed Supramolecular Assembly of UiO-66-NH₂ Crystals on Atomic Layer Deposition-Coated Textiles for Rapid Degradation of Chemical Warfare Agent Simulants

Highly tunable metal-organic framework (MOF) materials, including, for example, UiO-66-NH₂, are known to be effective catalysts to degrade chemical warfare agents (CWAs) with half-lives near 1 min. Therefore, many researchers have been actively working on producing supported MOF materials to improve application effectiveness by using relatively slow solvothermal synthesis or repetitious stepwise layer-by-layer methods. Herein, we demonstrate a facile route to rapidly assemble presynthesized UiO-66-NH₂ crystals onto nonwoven polypropylene (PP) fibrous mats at ambient temperature. Crystal assembly is chemically directed using β-cyclodextrin (β-CD) and cetyltrimethylammonium bromide (CTAB) as surfactant assembly agents, where the agents quickly (within 5 min) self-assemble on the crystal surface and promote physically robust chemical surface attachment while simultaneously impeding solution-phase crystal agglomeration. Furthermore, we find that when the PP is preconditioned using conformal metal oxide thin films, including Al₂O₃, TiO₂, or ZnO formed via atomic layer deposition (ALD), the hydrophilic metal oxide surface further helps improve assembly uniformity and MOF mass loading, producing MOF crystal loading as high as 40 wt % and an overall BET surface area exceeding 200 m²/g_(MOF+Fiber). Using these surface-assembled MOFs, we observe catalytic degradation of dimethyl 4-nitrophenyl phosphate (DMNP), a CWA simulant, with a half-life of less than 5 min.