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Insights into the relationships between physicochemical properties, solvent performance, and applications of deep eutectic solvents

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Abstract

Deep eutectic solvent (DES) is regarded as a new generation of green solvent due to its distinctive and tailorable physicochemical properties, such as low volatility, strong solubility, biodegradability, low-cost, environment-friendly, and feasibility of the structural design. As an alternative to traditional organic solvents and ionic liquids (ILs), DESs have been widely applied in many fields, such as organic chemical synthesis, electrochemical deposition, material preparation, biomass catalytic conversion, extraction and separation, detection and analysis, nanotechnology, gas absorption, and drug delivery. In this paper, through in-depth discussion on factors influencing the physicochemical properties of DESs, we summarized the relations between their composition, structure, and performance. Focusing on their solvent performance, we analyzed the latest research results of DESs with different physicochemical properties in various fields. It should be pointed out that designing and synthesizing DESs from the molecular structure aspect to regulate their physicochemical properties is the direction of accurately developing new functional applications of DESs.

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Funding

The authors gratefully thank the National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 21878190, No. 21476150, and No.21336008) for financial support.

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All authors are involved in some work of the manuscript. Man Zhang was a major contributor in writing the manuscript. Xingyilong Zhang and Yingying Liu wrote the first draft of the main manuscript text. Kejing Wu and Yingming Zhu prepared the Figures and Tables. Houfang Lu and Bin Liang provided critical revision of the manuscript. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.

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Correspondence to Houfang Lu.

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The authors declare no competing interests.

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Responsible Editor: Santiago V. Luis

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Zhang, M., Zhang, X., Liu, Y. et al. Insights into the relationships between physicochemical properties, solvent performance, and applications of deep eutectic solvents. Environ Sci Pollut Res 28, 35537–35563 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-021-14485-2

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-021-14485-2

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