

In this chapter, a comprehensive review of the recent advances in the design and fabrication of LnPOM-based materials according to its specific area of application is provided. Several functional materials and devices have been recently developed taking advantage of the unique LnPOMs properties for applications in heterogeneous catalysis, medical imaging, magnetism, chromism, optical and chemical sensing. The main synthetic routes for the preparation of LnPOM-based materials, namely the use of nanoparticles, surfactants, mesoporous (organo)silica, metal–organic frameworks, thin films, and others are also here revisited. The remarkable features of LnPOMs have led to a significant effort in the design of novel LnPOM-based materials for applications in a wide range of technological areas, being prepared via immobilization, intercalation or encapsulation approaches using a variety of support systems.


A plethora of different LnPOM architectures have been reported to date using vacant POM structures (Keggin, Lindqvist, Wells-Dawson, Preyssler-type, and others) as building blocks, and are briefly reviewed in this chapter. The synergistic combination between the peculiar properties of Ln cations and POMs results in coordination compounds with notable and enhanced physico-chemical features. Lanthanopolyoxometalates (LnPOMs), obtained through the coordination of polyoxometalates (POMs) and lanthanide ions (Ln), have received extraordinary interest of the scientific community over the last decades.
