Preferential incorporation of less polarizable donor nitrogen into porous organic polymers for versatile strategies

The presence of a heteroatom, particularly a nitrogen atom, in a framework material offers manifold advantages such as chelation capacity, Lewis basicity, and efficient hard-soft acid-base coordination. The recent decade has witnessed nitrogen-rich porous organic polymers (POPs) as the most developed, versatile class of porous materials, showing enormous promise as a platform for heterogeneous catalysis, gas capture and fixation, toxic pollutant removal, and energy storage, among others. The POPs are made from a variety of functional organic units linked by high-energy covalent bonds, utilizing sophisticated organic synthesis techniques. A decent number of publications, including reviews, appearing in the recent literature have focused on the facets of synthetic methodologies and their integration into organic transformation reactions, adsorption and separation technologies, and electrode material fabrication. This review aims to assist researchers in designing nitrogen-rich framework materials and correlating structurally divergent nitrogen species and nitrogen (N) content, which are promising for a vast array of applications ranging from catalysis, separation, to energy materials, as this is the need of the hour.