Synthetic control of chiral pore surfaces in covalent organic frameworks for enantioselective separation of chiral drugs

Enantioselective separations of racemates using porous materials are highly attractive and significant in both fundamental research and technological applications. However, achieving controlled chiral pore surfaces to create the necessary driving force for enantiomer discrimination poses a fundamental challenge. Herein, we demonstrate that chiral covalent organic frameworks (COFs) possess the essential characteristics for effective enantioseparations through synthetic control over pore surfaces. We synthesized three 3D chiral COFs (CCOFs) featuring abundant chiral recognition sites on the pore walls via the condensation of enantiopure dialdehyde of 2,2 '-dihydroxy-1,1 '-binaphthyl and tetraamine. All CCOFs with high stability exhibit an 11-fold interpenetrated framework with tubular open channels, decorated with dihydroxyl or diethoxyl groups. The CCOFs with dihydroxyl groups serve as solid adsorbents for the adsorptive separation and solid-phase extraction of various chiral 1-phenylethanol-derived enantiomers, particularly racemic drugs, achieving up to 98% enantiomeric excess. In contrast, the CCOF with diethoxy groups is unable to resolve the racemates. These CCOF materials can be recycled and reused without any apparent loss of performance. Density functional theory (DFT) calculations reveal that the enantiospecific recognition arises from the well-organized chiral inner sphere and multiple chiral host-guest interactions.