Metal deposition in air and water stable ionic liquids will revolutionise electrochemistry, claim scientists in Germany.

Frank Endres and Sherif Zein El Abedin at the Clausthal University of Technology have looked at nanoscale electrodeposition of metals in water and air stable ionic liquids. They deposited reactive elements like germanium, silicon and tantalum, achieving metallic tantalum electrodeposition for the first time. These nanostructured elements cannot be obtained from aqueous solution and could be used in semiconducting devices.

'We were simply curious about the nanoscale processes of metal and semiconductor deposition in ionic liquids, and after some drawbacks in the beginning we found that ionic liquids open the door to rather a novel electrochemistry,' said Endres.

The researchers found that the electrochemical side-reactions that occur during deposition in aqueous solutions did not take place during deposition in ionic liquids. This allowed the band gap of the resulting semiconductor to be measured under electrochemical conditions - a challenging task in aqueous solution, according to Endres.

Endres and Zein El Abedin say that ionic liquids will be important for nanotechnology and semiconductor nanostructure design and have the potential to revolutionise physical chemistry. 'We expect that theoreticians will perform calculations with ab initio and density functional methods as well as by Monte Carlo simulations,' said Endres. 'In parallel we expect application driven experiments, for example in catalysis, fuel cells, polymers, sensors, actuators and many more.'

Katie Gibb