Recent advances in the use of ionic liquids for electrochemical sensing

Ionic Liquids are salts that are liquid at (or just above) room temperature. They possess several advantageous properties ( e.g. high intrinsic conductivity, wide electrochemical windows, low volatility, high thermal stability and good solvating ability), which make them ideal as non-volatile electrolytes in electrochemical sensors. This mini-review article describes the recent uses of ionic liquids in electrochemical sensing applications (covering the last 3 years) in the context of voltammetric sensing at solid/liquid, liquid/liquid interfaces and carbon paste electrodes, as well as their use in gas sensing, ion-selective electrodes, and for detecting biological molecules, explosives and chemical warfare agents. A comment on the future direction and challenges in this field is also presented. Ionic liquids have many advantageous properties that can be exploited in sensor devices for selective analyte detection.