Research Projects

The carbon dioxide (CO₂) concentration in the Earth’s atmosphere was only about 270 ppm during pre-industrial time which skyrocketed up to around 400 ppm in May 2013. With an average increment rate of 2 ppm/year since the pre-industrial year, the global average concentration of CO₂ in the atmosphere has reached 421 ppm (0.04%) in May 2022, far exceeding its safe upper limit (350 ppm). According to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), the concentration level of CO₂ in the atmosphere will reach up to 450 ppm which would result in the increase of global temperature by 2 ⁰C. On the other hand, CO₂ is a readily available, inexpensive, non-toxic, and recyclable C1 source. A cost-effective, safe, and eco-friendly approach for chemically fixing CO₂ is highly desirable for capturing and converting CO₂. Sunlight is an excellent energy source for driving chemical reactions. Covalent organic frameworks (COFs) due to their intrinsic porosity, crystallinity, chemical stability, structural adjustability, along with their customizable semiconducting properties, make them excellent candidates for developing photocatalyst systems. However, in spite of being a promising photocatalyst material, COFs are rarely employed as photocatalysts for CO₂ incorporation into organic substrates. Therefore, there is an urgent need for exploring COF based photocatalyst systems for photocatalytic CO2 incorporation into organic substrates. In this project, metal complex appended novel subporphyrin based COFs and metal nano particle (MNP) loaded porphyrin based COFs will be synthesised. The photocatalytic capability of COF based materials will be exploited for the CO₂ incorporation into organic substrates resulting in functionalization of organic molecules with carboxylic acid group. This project will create a new avenue of research field, where the well tested photocatalytic capability of COF based materials will be exploited for the CO₂ incorporation into organic substrates resulting in functionalization of organic molecules with carboxylic acid group that have relevance to the manufacture of cosmetics, soaps, detergents, rubbers, dyes, animal feed, plastics, agrochemicals or pharmaceuticals, among others. Furthermore, at present scenario, photoincorporation of CO₂ into imine substrates for the construction of α-amino acids (α-AA) is particularly important as the unnatural amino acids thus produced could be subjected to investigation for their role in life. This project will contribute to the field of CO₂ capture and conversion which has relevance to the mitigation of CO₂ concentration from the atmosphere.