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Updated: May 31, 2026

Quantifying Mixing using Magnetic Resonance Imaging
Published on: January 25, 2012
Insights into Rotational and Translational Dynamics in Mixtures of Ethylene Glycol and Choline Chloride Using Nuclear
Carla C Fraenza1, Ramez A Elgammal2, Thomas A Zawodzinski2
1Department of Physics and Astronomy, Hunter College of CUNY, New York, New York 10065, United States.
Abstract:
This work examines molecular dynamics and interactions in ethylene glycol-choline chloride (EG-ChCl) mixtures across 0-33 mol % ChCl, spanning the true eutectic region near 17-20 mol % and the commonly used 1:2 formulation. We combine pulsed-field-gradient (PFG) diffusion, fast-field-cycling (FFC) relaxometry, temperature-dependent 13C T1, and nuclear Overhauser effect spectroscopy (NOESY) to disentangle local from macroscopic dynamics. PFG and FFC show that both translational and average rotational motions largely track the strong increase in viscosity with ChCl content, with ethylene glycol consistently diffusing faster than the choline cation and no global dynamical anomaly at the eutectic composition. More subtle, site-specific composition effects nevertheless emerge. The ratio of the diffusion coefficient of the hydroxyl group of choline to the diffusion coefficient of the methyl group of choline displays a shallow minimum in the 17-25 mol % region, indicating a modest change in how the hydroxyl-bearing end of choline samples the underlying translational motion relative to the methyl groups. 13C T1 analysis shows that rotational correlation times at 25 °C generally increase with ChCl, reflecting viscosity-coupled slowing, while the CH2-Nα site exhibits a small but reproducible deviation from this monotonic trend near the eutectic. NOESY spectra at similar compositions reveal enhanced cross-relaxation between EG and choline protons, consistent with increased headgroup-solvent contact density rather than a wholesale structural rearrangement. Overall, our multitechnique study demonstrates that EG-ChCl dynamics are predominantly viscosity-dominated, with the eutectic region acting as a subtle dynamical crossover where specific choline segments become maximally coupled to the hydrogen-bond network. These insights refine the structure-dynamics picture of choline-chloride DESs and provide practical guidance for tuning composition in electrochemical, separation, and catalytic applications.
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