Progress of superhydrophobic porous materials

Porous materials such as metal organic framework materials (MOFs), covalent organic framework materials (COFs), organic porous polymers (POPs), etc., have been used widely used in the fields of separation, catalysis, gas storage and drug release due to their diversity, designability, controllability and functionalization of pores. Despite these promising applications, some of the porous materials suffer from moisture-sensitivity and instability in aqueous media due to their inherent structural features. To overcome this problem, endowing them with hydrophobicity is an effective strategy. However, designing superhydrophobic porous materials has certain challenges. In this work, the progress of MOFs, COFs and POPs with (super-)hydrophobic property is introduced. Issues related to their design strategy, structures, and practical applications such as catalysis, oil/water separation and gas storage and separation were analyzed. Additionally, the current problems and the future research directions of the hydrophobic porous materials were discussed.