How fluorination affects the properties of ionic liquids - and how to avoid it.

What is it about?

Fluorinated ionic liquids have excellent properties, however fluorinated compounds have adverse effects in the environment. Hence, the use of such compounds must be avoided. To this end, it is important to understand where their excellent properties come from, so they can be substituted with other systems that have less or no fluorine in them.

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Why is it important?

The beneficial effects of fluorination are often attributed to basicity and coordination tendency. While important, we demonstrate that this is only part of a bigger picture. In particular, we show that conformational flexiblity is equally important, and must be considered when designing ionic liquids with large ions.