American Chemical Society, Journal of Physical Chemistry B (Soft Condensed Matter and Biophysical Chemistry), 30(116), p. 9089-9100, 2012
DOI: 10.1021/jp303166f
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In this work, the soft statistical associating fluid theory (soft-SAFT) equation of state (EoS) has been used to provide an accurate thermodynamic characterization of the pyridinium-based family of ionic liquids (ILs) with the bis(trifluoromethylsulfonyl)imide anion [NTf2]−. On the basis of recent molecular simulation studies for this family, a simple molecular model was proposed within the soft-SAFT EoS framework. The chain length value was transferred from the equivalent imidazolium-based ILs family, while the dispersive energy and the molecular parameters describing the cation–anion interactions were set to constant values for all of the compounds. With these assumptions, an appropriate set of molecular parameters was found for each compound fitting to experimental temperature–density data at atmospheric pressure. Correlations for the nonconstant parameters (describing the volume of the IL) with the molecular weight were established, allowing the prediction of the parameters for other pyridiniums not included in the fitting. Then, the suitability of the proposed model and its optimized parameters were tested by predicting high-pressure densities and second-order thermodynamic derivative properties such as isothermal compressibilities of selected [NTf2] pyridinium ILs, in a large range of thermodynamic conditions. The surface tension was also provided using the density gradient theory coupled to the soft-SAFT equation.