“Designer solvents“ or application of ionic liquids in area from membrane to catalysis

Prof. Ilya Vorotyntsev – head of department of Nanotechnology and Biotechnology of Nizhny Novgorod State Technical University n.a. R.E. Alekseev and head of the SMART PolyMaT Lab of University of Chemical Technology of Russia. Ionic liquids (IL) have emerged as an alternative to non environmentally friendly the volatile organic solvents. In very trendy Green chemistry context, the term “designer solvents” has been used to demonstrate the potential of these environmentfriendly IL in chemical engineering. IL which are made up of cation and anion can be designed to possess a definite set of properties. Being designer solvents, they can be modulated to suit the reaction conditions, therefore earning the name “task specific IL“. Since these liquids are able to dissolve several transition metal complexes, they have often been employed in recent times in several catalytic organic reactions to enhance reaction rates and selectivity. The term selectivity is also dedicated to the mem