Understanding the Formation of Azeotropes and Related Aspects

Chowdhury, Shrestha (2025) Understanding the Formation of Azeotropes and Related Aspects. PhD thesis, Indian Institute of Science Education and Research Kolkata.

Text (PhD thesis of Shrestha Chowdhury (16IP006)) 16IP006.pdf - Submitted Version Restricted to Repository staff only Download (12MB)

Abstract

Azeotrope connects to boiling of a liquid mixture at a given pressure without changing its composition. This is because partial pressures of the components in the liquid and vapor phases become equal at the azeotropic conditions. However, the combinatorial principle governing the selection of the right liquid components for producing azeotropes is unique, and the microscopic factors behind this “selection rule” are still unknown. Moreover, the molecular origin of the mixture specific azeotropic condition, that is, composition and temperature of the mixture has not yet been understood. It is a puzzle that ethanol forms azeotrope with water but methanol cannot, although both of them are completely miscible with water. Likewise, acetic acid does not form azeotrope with water but formic acid does. Considering the fact that approximately 450 binary and 150 ternary azeotropes with water have been reported so far, the need for developing a molecular-level understanding which dictates azeotrope formation in terms of interspecies interactions is critically important. Azeotropes have found wide applications, ranging from solvents for art restoration (isopropanol-hexane azeotrope) to rendering inflammability to cleaning fluids (2,3-dihydrodecafluoropentane through azeotrope formation with isopropanol) and even as mosquito repellents (nonanoic acid-ethylbutylacetyl aminopropionoate azeotrope).

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