Micelle Formation in Lanthanide-Based DES

Deep eutectic solvents (DES) share many features with ionic liquids (ie. tunable physicochemical properties) which makes them viable green solvents that are less toxic than typical ILs. The most studied DES are mixtures of organic salts and hydrogen bond donors (HBD), that form strongly hydrogen-bonded room temperature liquids however "Type IV" DES are composed of inorganic salts with similar HBD. Our initial studies on lanthanide nitrate hydrate:urea mixtures show that these solvents have low viscosity, but high surface tensions, similar to those of water, and appear to also support micellization. Here we propose to study nonionic and cationic micelles in cerium nitrate hydrate:urea to determine micelle structures and properties in these novel solvents with a view to applying them as soft templates to create porous ceria for catalysis applications.