Room Temperature Ionic Liquids from Purine and Pyrimidine Nucleobases

Purine and pyrimidine nucleobases are of central attraction in biological and chemical sciences as these bases or their derivative are primary components in genetic materials. The solubility of these components is the main concern and puts certain limitations on their use in laboratory synthesis of medicinally important molecules. In this work, efficient conversions of purine and pyrimidine nucleobases (namely uracil, thymine, adenine, guanine, xanthine and hypoxanthine) into corresponding completely water soluble salts are reported. All the reported salts are room temperature ionic liquids except xanthine salts which have melting points higher than 100 degrees C and hence cannot be called as ionic liquids. Synthesized room temperature ionic liquids from nucleobases were well characterized using spectral and thermal analysis. Experimental data of some physicochemical properties such as density, conductivity, glass transition temperature, melting temperature as well as decomposition temperature reported which shows that the reported ionic liquids are stable upto 200 degrees C.