Within the last decade, ionic liquids have come to the fore as environmentally-responsible designer solvents. But what are ionic liquids and what can they offer the analytical scientist? This article addresses these questions and chronicles recent progress made in the application of ionic liquids toward analytical problem-solving. While further progress is required before ionic liquids become m...

Room-temperature ionic liquids are a class of non-molecular ionic solvents with low melting points. Their properties have the potential to be especially useful as stationary phases in gas-liquid chromatography (GLC). A series of common ionic liquids were evaluated as GLC stationary phases. It was found that many of these ionic liquids suffer from low thermal stability and possess unfavorable re...

Supramolecular gelators comprising 1,3,5-benzenetricarboxylic acids and amino acid methyl esters (glycine, L-alanine, L-valine, L-leucine, L-methionine, and L-phenylalanine) for ionic liquids were developed. Ten types of ionic liquids were gelated using the above-mentioned gelators at relatively low concentrations. Field emission-scanning electron microscopy and confocal laser scanning microsco...

The lithium ion-ion interactions in protic ionic liquids can be very different compared to those in aprotic ionic liquids. In this study we show that, for equal lithium ion concentration, the lithium coordination number in protic ionic liquids is lower than that in aprotic ones. This lower coordination makes lithium ions more "free" to move in protic ionic liquids and it might have an important...

A new compound was detected during the production of 5-hydroxymethylfurfural (HMF) from glucose and cellulose in the ionic liquid 1-butyl-3-methylimidazolium chloride ([Bmim]Cl) at high temperatures. Further experiments found that it was derived from the reaction of HMF with [Bmim]Cl. The structure of new compound was established as 1-butyl-2-(5'-methyl-2'-furoyl)imidazole (BMI) based on nuclea...

Interfacial effects in (room temperature) ionic liquids at charged surfaces are very important for ionic liquids applications in electrochemistry,1 energy storage,2 catalysis3 and other areas (e.g., lubrication4,5). However despite the many articles published on this subject (several hundred papers just in 2013) there is still no general agreement in the literature about the main factors that g...

Vibrational spectroscopy has continued use as a powerful tool to characterize ionic liquids since the literature on room temperature molten salts experienced the rapid increase in number of publications in the 1990's. In the past years, infrared (IR) and Raman spectroscopies have provided insights on ionic interactions and the resulting liquid structure in ionic liquids. A large body of informa...

Ionic liquids are emerging as promising new electrolytes for supercapacitors. While their higher operating voltages allow the storage of more energy than organic electrolytes, they cannot currently compete in terms of power performance. More fundamental studies of the mechanism and dynamics of charge storage are required to facilitate the development and application of these materials. Here we ...