Ultrafast diffusion of Ionic Liquids Confined in Carbon Nanotubes

Abstract

Over the past decade many works have focused on various aspects of the dynamics of liquids confined at the nanoscale such as e.g. water flow enhancement through carbon nanotubes (CNTs). Transport of room temperature ionic liquids (RTILs) through various nanochannels has also been explored and some conflicting findings about their translational dynamics have been reported. In this work, we focus on translational dynamics of RTILs confined in various CNTs. By means of molecular dynamics simulations we highlight a substantially enhanced diffusion of confined RTILs with an increase up to two orders of magnitude with respect to bulk-phase properties. This ultrafast diffusion of RTILs inside CNTs is shown to result from the combination of various factors such as low friction, molecular stacking, size, helicity, curvature and cooperative dynamics effects.