The Influence of Water on the Alkyl Region Structure in Variable Chain Length Imidazolium-Based Ionic Liquid/Water Mixtures

Journal Article · Tue Sep 27 00:00:00 EDT 2016 · Journal of Physical Chemistry. B, Condensed Matter, Materials, Surfaces, Interfaces and Biophysical Chemistry

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1021/acs.jpcb.6b07853· OSTI ID:1798880

Thomaz, Joseph E. ^[1]; Lawler, Christian M. ^[1]; Fayer, Michael D. ^[1]

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1. Stanford Univ., CA (United States)

In this work, solutions of room temperature ionic liquids (RTILs) and water were studied by observing the reorientational dynamics of the fluorescent probe perylene. Perylene is solvated in the alkyl regions of the RTILs. Its D_2h symmetry made it possible to extract dynamical information on both in-plane and out-of-plane reorientation from time resolved fluorescence anisotropy measurements. Perylene reorientation reports on its interactions with the alkyl chains. The RTILs were a series of 1-alkyl-3-methylimidazolium tetrafluoroborates (C_nmimBF₄, where n is the number of carbons in the alkyl chain), and the effects on perylene’s dynamics were observed when varying the alkyl chain length of the cation (n = 4, 6, 8, and 10; butyl, hexyl, octyl, decyl) and varying the water content from pure RTIL to roughly three water molecules per RTIL ion pair. Time correlated single photon counting was used to measure the fluorescence anisotropy decays to determine the orientational dynamics. The friction coefficients for both the in-plane and out-of-plane reorientation were determined to eliminate the influence of changes in viscosity caused by both the addition of water and the different alkyl chain lengths. The friction coefficients provided information on the interactions of the perylene with it alkyl environment and how these interactions changed with chain length and water content. As chain length increased, the addition of water had less of an effect on the local alkyl environment surrounding the perylene. The friction coefficients generally increased with higher water contents; the inplane orientational motion was hindered significantly more than the out-of-plane motion. The restructuring of the alkyl regions is likely a consequence of a rearrangement of the ionic imidazolium head groups to accommodate partial solvation by water, which results in a change in the arrangement of the alkyl chains. At very high water content, BmimBF4 broke this general trend, with both in-plane and out-of-plane rotational friction decreasing above a water content of one water per ion pair. This decrease indicates a major reorganization of the overall liquid structure in high water content mixtures. In contrast to BmimBF₄, the longer chain length RTILs are not infinitely miscible with water, and do not show evidence of a major reorganization before reaching saturation and phase-separating. The results suggest that phase separation in longer chain length BF₄ RTILs is a consequence of their inability to undergo the reorganization of the alkyl regions necessary to accommodate high water concentrations.

• Research Organization: Stanford Univ., CA (United States)
• Sponsoring Organization: USDOE Office of Science (SC), Basic Energy Sciences (BES); National Science Foundation (NSF)
• Grant/Contract Number: FG02-84ER13251; CHE-1461477
• OSTI ID: 1798880
• Journal Information: Journal of Physical Chemistry. B, Condensed Matter, Materials, Surfaces, Interfaces and Biophysical Chemistry, Vol. 120, Issue 39; ISSN 1520-6106
• Publisher: American Chemical Society
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

37 INORGANIC, ORGANIC, PHYSICAL, AND ANALYTICAL CHEMISTRY
36 MATERIALS SCIENCE
14 SOLAR ENERGY
Hydrocarbons
Friction
Solvents
Aromatic compounds
Alkyls