Synergistic effects and correlating polarity parameters in binary mixtures of ionic liquids

Understanding how a chemical reaction proceeds in solution requires precise knowledge of solute-solvent interactions. Certain issues involved in ionic liquid binary mixtures are still not clearly understood, including: 1) the effects of hydrogen-bond-acceptor basicity (β) of solvents on the "synergistic effects" found in ionic liquid-alcohol mixtures, 2) the interrelation between the polarity parameters in binary mixtures, and 3) the application of a model for the description of normalised electronic transition energy for all the binary mixtures. Here, a detailed analysis of polarity parameters in both hydrophilic and hydrophobic ionic liquids has been carried out. A three-parameter model developed by Roses et al. [J. Chem. Soc. Perkin Trans. 2 1997, 1341-1348] was found to be applicable to all the binary mixtures, and synergistic effects are generated as a result of high β values of alcohols compared with those of the ionic liquids. A strong correlation was observed in the β values and hydrophobicities of pure ionic liquids, suggesting that β values can play a role in describing synergism.