Toxicity of ionic liquids prepared from biomaterials

• Eight ionic liquids from biosources, were prepared with moderate to good yields.
• The toxicity of ILs was checked against organisms of various levels of organization.
• The toxicity was observed to depend on both the cation and anion.
• Choline-amino acid ILs showed a remarkable low toxicity to A. salina and HeLa cell.
• None of ionic liquids exhibited marked toxicity to bacteria.

In search of environmentally-friendly ionic liquids (ILs), 14 were prepared based on the imidazolium, pyridinium and choline cations, with bromide and several amino acids as anions. Good yields were obtained in the synthesis of pyridinium ILs and those prepared from choline and amino acids. Four of the ILs synthesized from choline and the amino acids arginine, glutamine, glutamic acid and cystine are described here for the first time.The toxicity of the synthesized ILs was checked against organisms of various levels of organization: the crustacean Artemia salina; Human cell HeLa (cervical carcinoma); and bacteria with different types of cell wall, Bacillus subtilis and Escherichia coli. The toxicity was observed to depend on both the cation and anion. Choline-amino acid ILs showed a remarkable low toxicity to A. salina and HeLa cell culture, ten times less than imidazolium and pyridinium ILs. None of ionic liquids exhibited marked toxicity to bacteria, and the effect was 2–3 orders of magnitude smaller than that of the antibiotic chloramphenicol.