Thermodynamic Studies of Ionic Interactions in Aqueous Solutions of Imidazolium-Based Ionic Liquids [Emim][Br] and [Bmim][Cl]

Applications of spectroscopic techniques to the study of monomer-dimer equilibria for methylene blue in aqueous solutions containing ionic liquid: Probing the structural interactions involving water and ionic liquids

An understanding of the nature of interaction and bonding in dye aggregation process is important for such diverse problems and applications such as stacking interactions in biomolecules, staining properties, photodynamic therapy for cancer, energy transfer in lasing technology and energy transfer and electron transfer processes. In present communication we report visible absorption spectrums and their analysis for the dye methylene blue (MB) in concentration range of 1∙10^-6 - 1∙10^-4 M in aqueous solutions containing ionic liquids namely, 1-ethyl-3-methyl-imidazolium bromide, 1-butyl-3-methyl-imidazolium bromide and 1-hexyl-3-methyl-imidazolium bromide at 298 ± 1. In this concentration range of MB only Monomer ⇌ Dimer equilibria for the dye exist and hence the spectral characteristics in the visible range of 550-700 nm have been examined. The spectrums obtained are compared with those obtained in aqueous solutions of NaCl. Using suitable developed method of estimating molar absorption extinction coefficient values, the equilibrium constant values are obtained at various ionic strengths of imidazolium ions. It has been found that monomer and dimer absorption maximum occur at 665 and ≈605/610 nm, respectively, do not get much altered on addition of imidazolium ions. The extent of interaction between the MB and imidazolium cations varies with the concentration of imidazolium cations as well as the nature of imidazolium cations, that is, the chain length of the substituents. The dimer dissociation constant values extrapolated to zero ionic strength of ionic liquids exhibit systematic alteration with respect to alteration of chain length in imidazolium cations. The different interactional phenomena such as the formation of ion-pairs, ion-pair complexes, dimer dissociation, solubilization of monomers and binding of MB with imidazolium cations have been examined. The transfer standard free energy changes have been calculated for the transfer of dimers from aqueous solutions to aqueous solutions containing ionic liquids. The changes in dimer geometry from sandwich type and end-on-end types also have been studied. It is observed that the contribution to the interaction energy is mainly from van der Waals type and dispersion forces, in addition to short range forces involving multipoles. The binding of monomers with imidazolium cations is also examined in terms of formation of micellar type aggregates in solution phase. It is proposed that the water structural interaction and hydrophobic interactions are the major factors in the formation and dissociation of aggregates.

Study of the Chain Condensation Process from a Dilute to a Concentrated Solution and the Transformation of the Chain Conformation from a Solution to a Film for the Conjugated Polymer PFO

The chain behavior in a precursor solution and its condensation process are still key issues that have been paid close attention to but have not been solved yet for semirigid conjugated polymers. In this research, the chain condensation process from a dilute to a concentrated solution and the transformation of the chain conformation from a solution to a film for the conjugated polymer poly(9,9'-dioctylfluorene) (PFO) were investigated by a scaling law method obtained from rheological measurements. By establishing a scaling relationship between specific viscosity and concentration, it was found that the motion of molecular chains conformed to the Zimm model in dilute solution, and the motion of molecular chains conformed to the Rouse model in semidilute unentangled solution as well as conformed to the Edwards tube model in semidilute entangled solution. Furthermore, it was also found that toluene is a θ solvent for PFO at 25 °C. Some important physical parameters in connection with PFO intrinsic properties were also obtained here, such as intrinsic viscosity [η] = 136.84 mL g-1, root-mean-square end-to-end distance R = 41.4 nm, and Kuhn segment length b = 6.28 nm. In particular, this was the first time that the effect of the film-forming process of spin coating on the transformation proces of the PFO chain conformation from the precursor solution to a film was studied, and the spin-coating time (t) was found to be several orders of magnitude longer than the PFO chain relaxation time (τ Z(τ R)). This research enriches knowledge and understanding of the chain behavior in the precursor solution for semirigid conjugated polymers and reveals the correlation of chain behaviors in solution with the film's condensed state structure in the process of chain dynamic evolution from a solution to a film.

Influence of protic ionic liquids on hydration of glycine based peptides

The structure of water, especially around the solute is thought to play an important role in many biological and chemical processes. Water-peptide and cosolvent-peptide interactions are crucial in determining the structure and function of protein molecules. In this work, we present the H-bonding analysis for model peptides like glycyl-glycine (gly-gly), glycine-ւ-valine (gly-val), glycyl-ւ-leucine (gly-leu) and triglycine (trigly) and triethylammonium based carboxylate protic ionic liquids (PILs) in aqueous solutions as well as for peptides in ∼0.2 mol·L^-1 of aqueous PIL solutions in the spectral range of 7800-5500 cm^-1 using Fourier transform near-infrared (FT-NIR) spectroscopy at 298.15 K. The hydration numbers for peptides and PILs were obtained using NIR method of simultaneous estimation of hydration spectrum and hydration number of a solute dissolved in water. The H-bond of water molecules around peptides and PILs are found to be stronger and shorter than those in pure liquid water. We observe that the hydration shell around zwitterions is a clathrate-like cluster of water in which ions entrap. Watery network analysis confirms that singly H-bonded species or NHBs changes to partial or distorted ice-like structures of water in the hydration shell of PILs. The overall water H-bonding in the hydration sphere of PILs increases in the order TEAF < TEAA < TEAG < TEAPy ≈ TEAP < TEAB. The influence of PILs on hydration behavior of peptides is explored in terms of H-bonding, cooperativity, hydrophobicity, water structural changes, ionic interactions etc.

Thermodynamic destabilization of azurin by four different tetramethylguanidinium amino acid ionic liquids

The thermal unfolding of the copper redox protein azurin was studied in the presence of four different amino acid-based ionic liquids (ILs), all of which have tetramethylguanidium as cation. The anionic amino acid includes two with alcohol side chains, serine and threonine, and two with carboxylic acids, aspartate and glutamate. Control experiments showed that amino acids alone do not significantly change protein stability and pH changes anticipated by the amino acid nature have only minor effects on the protein. With the ILs, the protein is destabilized and the melting temperature is decreased. The two ILs with alcohol side chains strongly destabilize the protein while the two ILs with acid side chains have weaker effects. Unfolding enthalpy (ΔH_unf^°) and entropy (ΔS_unf^°) values, derived from fits of the unfolding data, show that some ILs increase ΔH_unf^°while others do not significantly change this value. All ILs, however, increase ΔS_unf^°. MD simulations of both the folded and unfolded protein conformations in the presence of the ILs provide insight into the different IL-protein interactions and how they affect the ΔH_unf^° values. The simulations also confirm that the ILs increase the unfolded state entropies which can explain the increased ΔS_unf^° values.

Effects of Ionic Liquids on Metalloproteins

In the past decade, innovative protein therapies and bio-similar industries have grown rapidly. Additionally, ionic liquids (ILs) have been an area of great interest and rapid development in industrial processes over a similar timeline. Therefore, there is a pressing need to understand the structure and function of proteins in novel environments with ILs. Understanding the short-term and long-term stability of protein molecules in IL formulations will be key to using ILs for protein technologies. Similarly, ILs have been investigated as part of therapeutic delivery systems and implicated in numerous studies in which ILs impact the activity and/or stability of protein molecules. Notably, many of the proteins used in industrial applications are involved in redox chemistry, and thus often contain metal ions or metal-associated cofactors. In this review article, we focus on the current understanding of protein structure-function relationship in the presence of ILs, specifically focusing on the effect of ILs on metal containing proteins.

Molecular simulation of osmometry in aqueous solutions of the BMIMCl ionic liquid: a potential route to force field parameterization of liquid mixtures

Despite widespread development and use of ionic liquids (ILs) in both academic and industrial research, computational force fields (FFs) for most of those are not available for a precise description of inter-species interactions in aqueous environments. In the scope of this study, by means of molecular simulations, the osmotic coefficient of an aqueous solution of an IL is calculated and used as a basis to reparameterize popular IL-FFs existing in the literature. We first calculate the osmotic coefficients (at 298.15 K and 1 atm pressure) of aqueous solutions of 1-butyl-3-methylimidazolium chloride (BMIMCl), a generic IL, popularly used in biomass processing and the subsequent conversion to value-added intermediates. The performance of two popular atomic, nonpolarizable FFs developed for BMIMCl, one by Lopes, Pádua, and coworkers (FF-LP) and the other by Sambasivarao, Acevedo, and coworkers (FF-SA), when mixed with the SPC/E water model, is tested with respect to their ability to reproduce the experimental osmotic coefficient data. Interestingly, the osmotic coefficient is found to be increasing with a gradual increase in IL molality within the concentration range of our investigation, which is contrary to the experimental trend reported in the literature for the same IL-water mixture. Henceforth, necessary corrections to the nonbonded ion-ion and ion-water interactions are made to match the experimental osmotic coefficient. To further assess the reliability of the new FF, we extensively explore the thermodynamic (density, isothermal compressibility, and thermal expansion coefficient), dynamic (diffusivity and viscosity), and association/dissociation properties (rationalized with the help of radial distribution functions) with both the original and reparameterized FF for a wider range of concentrations up to a molality of 18.50 mol kg-1. The calculated quantities are compared against experimental data wherever available. The modified FF parameters exhibit significant improvements in terms of its ability to match experimental solution properties, such as density, viscosity, association/dissociation, etc. We report that excessive dissociation of BMIMCl in water is responsible for the shortcomings observed in the original FFs and improved prediction of physicochemical properties could be achieved using the modified FFs.

Dielectric Relaxation and Hydration Interactions for Protic and Aprotic Ionic Liquids using Time Domain Reflectometry

H-Bonding abilities of ionic liquids (ILs) along with hydrophobicity and cooperativity effects increases their hydration numbers making them capable for dissolving sparingly soluble organic molecules in aqueous or polar nonaqueous media, and hence ILs are potential candidates in pharmaceutical and medicinal sciences besides the different technological and academic interests. In this work, dielectric spectra were measured and analyzed for diethylammonium-based protic ionic liquids (PILs), imidazolium-based aprotic ionic liquids (APILs), and their aqueous solutions (∼0.02 to ∼0.8 mol·dm^-3) over a frequency range from 0.01 to 50 GHz using time domain reflectometry at 298.15 K. The Cole-Cole (CC) model for neat ILs and a combination of the Debye and Cole-Cole (D+CC) models for their aqueous solutions best describes the experimental dielectric relaxation spectra. Higher values of static permittivity and relaxation time were observed for less viscous PILs compared to more viscous APILs due to the existence of hydrogen bonding in PILs, ionic translational motion, and the existence of transient, short-lived proton transfer responsible for solvent polarization. For aqueous solutions of ionic liquids, the fast collective relaxation of solvent (bulk water) observed at higher frequencies (∼20 GHz) and slow relaxation is detected at lower frequency (∼5 to ∼10 GHz) due to hydrophobic hydration with or without cooperative H-bonding effect. The apparent concentrations of bulk water, c_bw^ap, and slow water, c_sw^ap, were used to obtain effective hydration numbers to understand the ion solvation. Hydration numbers revealed that imidazolium-based APILs are weakly hydrated than the diethylammonium-based PILs. Static permittivity and relaxation time of pure ILs and of aqueous solutions of studied ILs are discussed in terms of effect on alkyl chain length of cation/anion, H-bonding abilities of ions, dipole moments of ions, viscosity, hydrophobic effects, etc.

The peculiar effect of water on ionic liquids and deep eutectic solvents

Ionic liquids (ILs) and deep eutectic solvents (DESs) have been suggested as eco-friendly alternatives to organic solvents. A trace amount of water is often unavoidable as impurity, and water is also added on purpose to reduce their problematically high viscosity and lower their high price. Understanding the distinct effects of water on the properties of ILs/DESs is highly important. In this review, we collect published experimental and theoretical results for IL/DES-H2O systems at varied water concentrations and analyze them. Results from mechanistic studies, thermodynamic modelling and advanced experiments are collected and critically discussed. Six commonly studied IL/DES-H2O systems were selected to map experimental observations onto microscopic results obtained in mechanistic studies. A great variety of distinct contours of the excess properties can be observed over the entire compositional range, indicating that the properties of IL/DES-H2O systems are highly unpredictable. Mechanistic studies clearly demonstrate that the added H2O rapidly changes the heterogeneous 3D structures of pure ILs/DESs, leading to very different properties and behaviour. There are similarities between aqueous electrolytes and IL/DES solutions but the bulky and asymmetric organic cations in ILs/DESs do not conform to the standard salt dissolution and hydration concepts. Thermodynamic modelling previously assumes ILs/DESs to be either a neutral ion-pair or completely dissociated ions, neglecting specific ion hydration effects. A new conceptual framework is suggested for thermodynamic modelling of IL/DES-H2O binary systems to enable new technologies for their practical applications.

Volumetric, Ultrasonic and Viscometric Studies of Aspirin in the Presence of 1-Octyl-3-Methylimidazolium Bromide Ionic Liquid in Acetonitrile Solutions at T=(288.15–318.15) K

In a continuation of previous studies, thermophysical properties of the systems containing aspirin (ASA), ionic liquid, 1-octyl-3-methylimidazolium bromide ([OMIM][Br]) and acetonitrile (MeCN) have been determined. These properties contain density, viscosity, speed of sound and refractive index measured at T=(288.15 K–318.15 K) and at atmospheric pressure. The measured data have been applied to calculate the apparent molar volumes at infinite dilution V φ 0 , $V_\varphi ^0,$ transfer volumes Δ V φ 0 , $\Delta V_\varphi ^0,$ apparent molar isentropic compressibilities κ ϕ , to viscosity B-coefficients and solvation number. The positive values of Δ V φ 0 $\Delta V_\varphi ^0$ and Δ κ φ 0 $\Delta \kappa _\varphi ^0$ indicate that dominant interactions between ASA and ionic liquid are ion–polar and polar–polar interactions. From the obtained parameters, some information in regard with the solute–solvent interactions in the studied systems was obtained. The cosphere overlap model was used to interpret the positive transfer volume Δ V φ 0 . $\Delta V_\varphi ^0.$

Molecular thermodynamic modeling of ionic liquids using the perturbation-based linear Yukawa isotherm regularity

In this paper, we present the results of an extensive study on a novel approach to the molecular modeling of pure ionic liquids (ILs) that incorporates the perturbed thermodynamic linear Yukawa isotherm regularity (LYIR), which is derived based on an effective nearest neighboring pair attractive interaction of the Yukawa potential. The LYIR was used to model the densities of ILs up to high pressures (35 MPa) and in the temperature range 293.15 to 393.15 K. To use the LYIR for ILs, a simple molecular model was proposed to describe their molecular structure, in which they were considered as a liquid consisting of the ion pairs moving together in the fluid, and each ion pair was assumed to be a one-center spherical united atom. The ILs under consideration contained one of the IL cations [C2mim](+), [C4mim](+), [C7mim](+), [C8mim](+), [C3mpy](+), [C3mpip](+), [C3mpyr](+) or [C4mpyr](+), and one of the IL anions [BF4](-), [C(CN)3](-), [CF3SO4](-) or [NTf2](-). The reliability and physical significance of the parameters as well as the proposed molecular model were tested by calculating the densities of pure imidazolium-, pyridinium-, piperidinium- and pyrrolidimium-based ILs. The results showed that the LYIR can be used to predict and reproduce the density of ILs in good agreement with the experimental data. In addition, the LYIR enabled us to determine the physical quantities, such as an effective Yukawa screening length, λ eff, the product of the effective energy well depth and the effective coordination number, (ε eff/k)z eff, the contribution of the non-reference thermal pressure and also the influence of the anionic and cationic structure on the λ eff parameter. The standard deviation of the IL densities predicted in this work is lower than those calculated by the one other important equation of state reported in the literature.

Densities, Viscosities and Derived Thermophysical Properties of Water-Saturated Imidazolium-Based Ionic Liquids

In order to evaluate the impact of the alkyl side chain length and symmetry of the cation on the thermophysical properties of water-saturated ionic liquids (ILs), densities and viscosities as a function of temperature were measured at atmospheric pressure and in the (298.15 to 363.15) K temperature range, for systems containing two series of bis(trifluoromethylsulfonyl)imide-based compounds: the symmetric [C n C n im][NTf2] (with n = 1-8 and 10) and asymmetric [C n C1im][NTf2] (with n = 2-5, 7, 9 and 11) ILs. For water-saturated ILs, the density decreases with the increase of the alkyl side chain length while the viscosity increases with the size of the aliphatic tails. The saturation water solubility in each IL was further estimated with a reasonable agreement based on the densities of water-saturated ILs, further confirming that for the ILs investigated the volumetric mixing properties of ILs and water follow a near ideal behaviour. The water-saturated symmetric ILs generally present lower densities and viscosities than their asymmetric counterparts. From the experimental data, the isobaric thermal expansion coefficient and energy barrier were also estimated. A close correlation between the difference in the energy barrier values between the water-saturated and pure ILs and the water content in each IL was found, supporting that the decrease in the viscosity of ILs in presence of water is directly related with the decrease of the energy barrier.

Physical state of cellulose in BmimCl: dependence of molar mass on viscoelasticity and sol-gel transition

Monitoring cellulose depolymerization and phase transition in ionic liquid.

Effect of cation type, alkyl chain length, adsorbate size on adsorption kinetics and isotherms of bromide ionic liquids from aqueous solutions onto microporous fabric and granulated activated carbons

The adsorption from aqueous solution of imidazolium, pyrrolidinium and pyridinium based bromide ionic liquids (ILs) having different alkyl chain lengths was investigated on two types of microporous activated carbons: a fabric and a granulated one, well characterized in terms of surface chemistry by "Boehm" titrations and pH of point of zero charge measurements and of porosity by N2 adsorption at 77 K and CO2 adsorption at 273 K. The influence of cation type, alkyl chain length and adsorbate size on the adsorption properties was analyzed by studying kinetics and isotherms of eight different ILs using conductivity measurements. Equilibrium studies were carried out at different temperatures in the range [25-55 °C]. The incorporation of ILs on the AC porosity was studied by N2 adsorption-desorption measurements at 77 K. The experimental adsorption isotherms data showed a good correlation with the Langmuir model. Thermodynamic studies indicated that the adsorption of ILs onto activated carbons was an exothermic process, and that the removal efficiency increased with increase in alkyl chain length, due to the increase in hydrophobicity of long chain ILs cations determined with the evolution of the calculated octanol-water constant (Kow). The negative values of free energies indicated that adsorption of ILs with long chain lengths having hydrophobic cations was more spontaneous at the investigated temperatures.

Flow behavior and linear viscoelasticity of cellulose 1-allyl-3-methylimidazolium formate solutions

The rheological properties of α-cellulose 1-allyl-3-methylimidazolium formate solutions were investigated using shear viscosity and dynamic rheological measurements in a large range of concentrations (0.1-10 wt%) at 25 °C. In steady shear measurement, the overlap concentration (c*) and the entanglement concentration (c(e)) were determined to be 0.5 and 2.0 wt% respectively, and the exponents of the specific viscosity (η(sp)) versus the concentration (c) were determined as 1.0, 2.0 and 4.7 for dilute, semidilute unentangled and entangled regimes respectively, which were in accordance with the scaling prediction for neutral polymer in θ solvent. The slopes of the relaxation time (τ) against the concentration for semidilute unentangled and entangled regimes were observed as 1.0 and 2.5 respectively. In dilute and semidilute unentangled regimes, failure of the Cox-Merz rule with steady shear viscosity larger than complex viscosity was observed; while the deviation from the Cox-Merz rule disappeared in semidilute entangled regime.

Influence of the solvent on the stability of bis(terpyridine) structures on graphite

The effect of solvation on the adsorption of organic molecules on graphite at room temperature has been addressed with force-field molecular dynamics simulations. As a model system, the solvation of a bis(terpyridine) isomer in water and 1,2,4-trichlorobenzene was studied with an explicit solvation model. The inclusion of solvation has a noticeable effect on adsorption energies. Although the results of the various considered force fields differ quite significantly, they all agree that the adsorption of BTP from the TCB solvent is almost thermoneutral. The substrate simply acts as a template to allow a planar arrangement of the network, which is stabilized by the intermolecular interaction. Using an atomic thermodynamics approach, the order of the stability of various network structures as a function of the chemical potential is derived yielding a sequence in agreement with the experiment.