Theoretical study of adsorption of sarin and soman on tetrahedral edge clay mineral fragments

This study provides details of the structure and interactions of Sarin and Soman with edge tetrahedral fragments of clay minerals. The adsorption mechanism of Sarin and Soman on these mineral fragments containing the Si(4+) and Al(3+) central cations was investigated. The calculations were performed using the B3LYP and MP2 levels of theory in conjunction with the 6-31G(d) basis set. The studied systems were fully optimized. Optimized geometries, adsorption energies, and Gibbs free energies of Sarin and Soman adsorption complexes were computed. The number and strength of formed intermolecular interactions have been analyzed using the AIM theory. The charge of the systems and a termination of the mineral fragment are the main contributing factors on the formation of intermolecular interactions in the studied systems. In the neutral complexes, Sarin and Soman is physisorbed on these mineral fragments due to the formation of C-H...O, and O-H...O hydrogen bonds. The chemical bond is formed between a phosphorus atom of Sarin and Soman and an oxygen atom of the -2 charged clusters containing an Al(3+) central cation and -1 charged complex containing a Si(4+) central cation (chemisorption). Sarin and Soman interact mostly in the same way with the same terminated edge mineral fragments containing different central cations. However, the interaction energies of the complexes with an Al(3+) central cation are larger than these values for the Si(4+) complexes. The interaction enthalpies of all studied systems corrected for the basis set superposition error were found to be negative. However, on the basis of the Gibbs free energy values, only strongly interacting complexes containing a charged edge mineral fragment with an Al(3+) central cation are stable at room temperature. We can conclude that Sarin and Soman will be adsorbed preferably on this type of edge mineral surfaces. Moreover, on the basis of the character of these edge surfaces, a tetrahedral edge mineral fragment can provide effective centers for the dissociation.