Solvent relaxation of a room-temperature ionic liquid [bmim][PF6] confined in a ternary microemulsion

In this paper we have reported the solvent and rotational relaxation of 1-butyl-3-methyl-imidazolium hexafluorophosphate ([bmim][PF6]) confined in tween 20/([bmim][PF6]/water microemulsion using coumarin 153 (C-153) as probe. The most interesting feature of our experiment was that we observed an increase in solvent relaxation time with increase in R (R = tween 20-to-[bmim][PF6] molar ratio). This is due to the fact that with increase in [bmim][PF6] content of the microemulsions, the microviscosity of the pool of the microemulsions increases, and motion of ions of [bmim][PF6] is hindered in the pool of microemulsions. Since motion of ions is responsible for solvation in room-temperature ionic liquids (RTILs), solvent-relaxation time increases with increase in R.