Reticular materials for wastewater treatment

Abstract

Rapid industrialization and population growth have led to an unprecedented demand for safe and reliable water supplies. With the discovery of new pollutants, the original sewage treatment technology cannot meet the increasingly stringent standards enforced by environmental agencies worldwide for safe drinking water. Recently, there has been a lot of interest in the use of reticular materials in water treatment due to their adjustable aperture and thus customizable performance. To better exploit their potential, this review briefly describes reticular materials in terms of advantages and limitations. In view of the enormous effort to design these materials through trial and error experiments, machine learning and synthesis approaches with water stability in design and synthesis processes are analyzed. Finally, the latest research progress of reticular materials in wastewater treatment technologies, including adsorption, advanced oxidation process and membrane separation, is discussed. This review is expected to help with the design and development of reticular materials, allowing them to be used in successful water treatment.