Dissolution of chitin in deep eutectic solvents composed of imidazolium ionic liquids and thiourea

Abstract

Chitin is an abundant organic resource but shows poor solubility, leading to difficulty in utilization as materials. We have already reported that an ionic liquid (IL), 1-allyl-3-methylimidazolium bromide, dissolves chitin at concentrations up to ca. 5 wt %. However, the color of the resulting solution is blackened, mainly owing to the presence of bromide. On the other hand, some deep eutectic solvents (DESs) have been already reported to dissolve chitin. In this study, we found that DESs composed of imidazolium ILs and thiourea dissolved chitin without obvious coloring. DESs are systems formed from eutectic mixtures of hydrogen bond accepters and donors. We first prepared DESs by heating mixtures of imidazolium ILs with thiourea at 100◦C for 30 min with stirring. Predetermined amounts of chitin were then added to the DESs, and for the dissolution, the mixtures were left standing at room temperature for 24 h, followed by heating at 100◦C for 24 h with stirring. The dissolution processes were evaluated by CCD camera views, which revealed in most cases the dissolution of chitin at 2–5 wt % concentrations with the present DESs.