Stearin as a Starting Material for the Synthesis of Biologically Active Ionic Liquids

The possibility of using widely available stearin to produce fatty acid-derived ionic liquids (ILs) has been shown for the first time. New amphiphilic ILs based on imidazolium, pyridinium, and quaternary ammonium cations containing long-chain alkyl substituents have been prepared. The synthesized compounds have been shown to have biological activity comparable to known antimicrobial compounds. ILs with one alkyl substituent have higher cytotoxicity and antimicrobial activity compared to disubstituted derivatives.