A crystalline porous metal-organic framework Cu(BDC) was synthesized, and characterized by several techniques, including X-ray powder diffraction (XRD), scanning electron microscopy (SEM), transmission electron microscopy (TEM), therrnogravimetric analysis (TGA), Fourier transform infrared (Fr-IR), atomic absorption spectrophotometry (MS), hydrogen temperature-programmed reduction (H-2-TPR), and nitrogen physisorption measurements. The Cu(BDC) exhibited high catalytic activity for the modified Friedlander transformation using 2-aminobenzyl alcohol as the starting material, thus offering advantages over the conventional Friedlander reaction in terms of avoiding the problems associated with the storage of the highly unstable 2-aminobenzaldehyde. Moreover, the Cu(BDC) could offer significantly higher catalytic activity than that of other Cu-MOFs such as Cu-3(BTC)(2), Cu(BPDC), and Cu-2(BDC)(2)(DABCO). The catalyst could be recovered and reused several times without a significant degradation in catalytic activity. The modified Friedlander reaction could only occur in the presence of the solid Cu(BDC) with no contribution from leached active species. (C) 2013 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.