Adsorption of Choline Phenylalanilate on Polyaromatic Hydrocarbon-Shaped Graphene and Reaction Mechanism with CO₂: A Computational Study

The interaction of ionic liquids (ILs) with carbon materials is of fundamental importance in several areas of materials science, physics, and chemistry. Their adsorption on pristine and N-doped graphene surfaces is discussed here on the basis of results of density functional theory calculations. The nature of adsorption was investigated for an amino acid (AA)-based IL consisting of the choline cation [Ch] and the l-phenylalanilate anion [Phe] that interacts with a sheet of N-doped graphene. The interaction mechanism, binding energy, electron density, and non-covalent interaction analysis were evaluated by considering the cation, anion, and ion pair adsorbed on graphene separately. The distribution of cations and anions in the liquid bulk and on the graphene surface was then analyzed by molecular dynamics simulations. Since AA-based ILs are efficient absorbents for capture of CO2 due to the pronounced affinity of carbon dioxide to react with amino groups, we investigated the capacity of [Ch][Phe] to react with CO2 under various conditions. We considered the multistep mechanism of the reaction of [Phe] with CO2 first for the anion in the liquid bulk and then for the [Phe] anion adsorbed on the graphene surface. The initial step, the formation of the zwitterionic addition product, is followed by its structural rearrangement through intramolecular proton transfer and conformational isomerization processes to form carboxylic acid derivatives. The entire mechanism was evaluated for the [Phe] anion before and after adsorption on graphene to investigate how interactions with surfaces of carbon materials can affect the CO2 capture capacity of an AA-based IL such as [Ch][Phe].