Imidazolium based ionic liquids' structure and optical properties influenced by semiconductor metal oxide thin films

This paper reports the preparation of two protic ionic liquids (PILs) 2-methylimidazolium lactate and 2-methylimidazolium acetate through simple proton-transfer reaction by microwave irradiation method. This work further improves the influences of semiconductor metal oxides like CuO (p-type), ZnO (n-type) [two transition metal oxides] and SnO2 (n-type a non-transition metal oxide) over the synthesized PILs. These metal oxides were prepared by sol-gel method and doped over the synthesized ILs by making thin films by spin coating method. The focus of the present study is to learn how the band gap of p-type and n-type metal oxide varies when it is incorporated over the PILs. Their structure, optical properties and morphology were studied through FT-IR, UV-Visible, photoluminescence and XRD spectral studies.