Interfacial Chemical Reactions in Deep Eutectic Solvents

Volatile organic solvents are used in the majority of chemical syntheses but due to their adverse effects on health and the environment, replacements are sought. Recent work on deep eutectic solvents (DES) has demonstrated that these novel liquids can replace organic solvents and bring exciting advantages. In addition to being inexpensive, non-flammable and having a low volatility it has been shown that reactions using organolithium reagents in DES can be carried out at room temperature in air, in the presence of water - conditions that are normally incompatible with polar organometallic compounds. However our initial work on a reaction using model ketone in an arylation reaction with phenyl-lithium suggests it occurs primarily at the oil-DES interface. Here we wish to probe solvent and solute structures at this interface to better understand how DES mediate this reaction.