A facile detection of ethanol by the Be/Mg/Ca-enhanced fullerenes: Insights from density functional theory

Abstract

This work was done due to a need of developing a facile detection platform of ethanol (EtOH) type of alcohol for various reasons from the police uses up to the medical and industrial uses. To this aim, a representative model of fullerene (FULL) was doped by each of the beryllium (Be), magnesium (Mg), and calcium (Ca) alkali-earth atoms to produce MFULL counterparts including BeFULL, MgFULL, and CaFULL to be examined towards the adsorption of EtOH substance. Accordingly, the models were stabilized and their structural features were evaluated in addition to the evaluation of electronic based frontier molecular orbital features. The results showed possibility of formation of EtOH@FULL and EtOH@MFULL complexes by a priority of formation of the doped models, in which the formation of EtOH@BeFULL complex was found at the highest level of suitability regarding the energy terms and integration details. Subsequently, the electronic features indicated measurable variation of molecular orbital levels to approach a point of detection of adsorbed EtOH by the assistance of fullerenes. Meaningful results were found by performing density functional theory (DFT) calculations for showing the stability of EtOH@MFULL complexes besides evaluating measurable electronic features. Accordingly, the idea of developing a facile detection of EtOH by the Be/Mg/Ca-enhanced fullerenes was affirmed.