26 February 2015
Ionic liquid is the material of the future

The results of the completion for young scientists for grants of the President of Russian Federation were presented recently. Scientific group of Kazan Federal University supervised by Mikhail Varfolomeev, senior researcher at “In-situ combustion” laboratory of KFU is one of the winners.

"This grant is issued to the young scientist or a group of students and PhD students under supervision of the young researcher. There are two PhD students Ilnaz Rakipov and Artashes Khachatran and three students Bulat Akhmadeev, Timur Musin, and Artyom Petrov in our group”, explained Mikhail Varfolomeev.  

There is no surprise that scientists of Kazan Federal University are among the winners of the contest. Mikhail Varfolomeev himself has already won the grant of the President of Russia in 2007 but unlike the current grant that one was personal. Besides that, it's worth mentioning that Mister Varfolomeev is the author of 37 Scopus publications.  

The name of the project presented to the contests is “Ionic liquids as prospective dissolvent that can be used in chemical industry: the role of nonvalent interactions for solution”. The project is dedicated to the research of the possible use of ionic liquid for new materials. “Ionic liquid can be very perspective materials and the scientific interest for that theme is rapidly growing'', claimed Mikhail Varfolomeev.

Ionic liquid can specifically attract the interest of scientists with their particular mix of characteristics: liquid and ionic at the same time.  "Electrochemical characteristics of ionic liquids are particularly interesting for our research. Ionic liquids can become perspective catalyst”, explained.

The other important aspect is solvents thermophor treats of ionic liquids. Mikhail Varfolomeev explained that in comparison with other solvents and thermophors ionic liquids cover wider range of temperatures wich is quite significant for chemical industry.  

Mikhail Varfolomeev explained the project in the following way: “We are trying to find out the areson of the wide temperature range of ionic liquids, and to propose ionic liquids that can be used in this or that processes, for example biomaterials conversion. To sum up, at this stage we are analyzing thermophysical and thermochemical characteristics of ionic liquids”.  

It's worth mentioning that besides fundamental research the scientific group of Mikhail Varfolomeev is also working on applied studies. So, scientific projects connected with oil extraction and petroleum development can be mentioned. Scientists also added that the Alexander Butlerov Chemical Institute in collaboration with the Institute of Geology and Petroleum Technologies have started the new project on the new technologies of low-grade oil extraction.

Finally, Mikhail Varfolomeev advised young scientists to take part in various grant programs since it's a good opportunity to ameliorate the level of the research. 

Source of information: Anna Kirpichnikova, 'Kazan University' newspaper
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