In this article, the adsorption of cytosine and guanine molecules on the surface of Cr-doped C20 fullerene (C19Cr) and Ni-doped C20 fullerene (C19Ni) are studied using first-principles density functional theory (DFT) calculations. In order to thoroughly comprehend the influences of the molecules on the metal-fullerene complexes, the geometric parameters, the binding energies, transferred charges, the magnitude of dipole moments, thermochemical parameters, frontier molecular orbitals, and the global indices of activities are calculated. The results highlighted that the interactions of both cytosine and guanine molecules with metal-fullerene complexes are highly exothermic, suggesting that these molecules might be chemisorbed on their adsorbents. The C19Cr exhibits a better adsorption behavior toward the molecules compared to C19Ni, and cytosine has the higher binding energies with metal-fullerene complexes in comparison with guanine. Further analyses showed that the C19Cr experiences significant changes in its electronic properties upon adsorption of the cytosine molecule. However, the small variations in the electronic properties of C19Ni after complexation with guanine indicate that this complex is not sensitive to the guanine. Furthermore, the results of frontier molecular orbital reveal the strong (moderate) interactions between the C19Cr with the cytosine (guanine) molecule and moderate (weak) interactions between the C19Ni with the cytosine (guanine) molecule. Therefore, the C19Cr and C19Ni have moderate sensitivities to cytosine and guanine molecules. More excitingly, our findings divulge promising potential of the Cr-fullerene complex as a biochemical adsorbent for cytosine. (C) 2017 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.