No Arabic abstract
We have employed molecular dynamics simulations based on the TIP4P/2005 water model to investigate the local structural, dynamical, and dielectric properties of the two recently reported body-centered-cubic and face-centered-cubic plastic crystal phases of water. Our results reveal significant differences in the local orientational structure and rotational dynamics of water molecules for the two polymorphs. The probability distributions of trigonal and tetrahedral order parameters exhibit a multi-modal structure, implying the existence of significant local orientational heterogeneities, particularly in the face-centered-cubic phase. The calculated hydrogen bond statistics and dynamics provide further indications of the existence of a strongly heterogeneous and rapidly interconverting local orientational structural network in both polymorphs. We have observed a hindered molecular rotation, much more pronounced in the body-centered-cubic phase, which is reflected by the decay of the fourth-order Legendre reorientational correlation functions and angular Van Hove functions. Molecular rotation, however, is additionally hindered in the high-pressure liquid compared to the plastic crystal phase. The results obtained also reveal significant differences in the dielectric properties of the polymorphs due to the different dipolar orientational correlation characterizing each phase.
We perform ab initio molecular dynamics (AIMD) simulation of liquid water in the canonical ensemble at ambient conditions using the SCAN meta-GGA functional approximation, and carry out systematic comparisons with the results obtained from the GGA-level PBE functional, and Tkatchenko-Scheffler van der Waals (vdW) dispersion correction inclusive PBE functional. We analyze various properties of liquid water including radial distribution functions, oxygen-oxygen-oxygen triplet angular distribution, tetrahedrality, hydrogen bonds, diffusion coefficients, ring statistics, density of states, band gaps, and dipole moments. We find that the SCAN functional is generally more accurate than the other two functionals for liquid water by not only capturing the intermediate-range vdW interactions but also mitigating the overly strong hydrogen bonds prescribed in PBE simulations. We also compare the results of SCAN-based AIMD simulations in the canonical and isothermal-isobaric ensembles. Our results suggest that SCAN provides a reliable description for most structural, electronic, and dynamical properties in liquid water.
We have investigated thermodynamic and dynamic properties as well as the dielectric constant of water-metha-nol model mixtures in the entire range of composition by using constant pressure molecular dynamics simulations at ambient conditions. The SPC/E and TIP4P/Ew water models are used in combination with the OPLS united atom modelling for methanol. Changes of the average number of hydrogen bonds between particles of different species and of the fractions of differently bonded molecules are put in correspondence with the behavior of excess mixing volume and enthalpy, of self-diffusion coefficients and rotational relaxation times. From the detailed analyses of the results obtained in this work, we conclude that an improvement of the description of an ample set of properties of water-methanol mixtures can possibly be reached, if a more sophisticated, carefully parameterized, e.g., all atom, model for methanol is used. Moreover, exploration of parametrization of the methanol force field, with simultaneous application of different combination rules for methanol-water cross interactions, is required.
Isothermal-isobaric molecular dynamics simulations have been performed to examine an ample set of properties of the model water-N,N-dimethylformamide (DMF) mixture as a function of composition. The SPC-E and TIP4P-Ew water models together with two united atom models for DMF [Chalaris M., Samios J., J. Chem. Phys., 2000, 112, 8581; Cordeiro J., Int. J. Quantum Chem., 1997, 65, 709] were used. Our principal analyses concern the behaviour of structural properties in terms of radial distribution functions, and the number of hydrogen bonds between molecules of different species as well as thermodynamic properties. Namely, we explore the density, excess mixing molar volume and enthalpy, the heat capacity and excess mixing heat capacity. Finally, the self-diffusion coefficients of species and the dielectric constant of the system are discussed. In addition, surface tension of water-DMF mixtures has been calculated and analyzed.
The phase behavior of charged rods in the presence of inter-rod linkers is studied theoretically as a model for the equilibrium behavior underlying the organization of actin filaments by linker proteins in the cytoskeleton. The presence of linkers in the solution modifies the effective inter-rod interaction and can lead to inter-filament attraction. Depending on the systems composition and physical properties such as linker binding energies, filaments will either orient perpendicular or parallel to each other, leading to network-like or bundled structures. We show that such a system can have one of three generic phase diagrams, one dominated by bundles, another by networks, and the third containing both bundle and network-like phases. The first two diagrams can be found over a wide range of interaction energies, while the third occurs only for a narrow range. These results provide theoretical understanding of the classification of linker proteins as bundling proteins or crosslinking proteins. In addition, they suggest possible mechanisms by which the cell may control cytoskeletal morphology.
The properties of model solutions consisting of a solute --- single curcumin molecule in water, methanol and dimethyl sulfoxide solvents have been studied using molecular dynamics (MD) computer simulations in the isobaric-isothermal ensemble. The united atom OPLS force field (OPLS-UA) model for curcumin molecule proposed by us recently [J. Mol. Liq., 2016, 223, 707] in combination with the SPC/E water, and the OPLS-UA type models for methanol and dimethyl sulfoxide have been applied. We have described changes of the internal structure of the solute molecule induced by different solvent media in very detail. The pair distribution functions between particular fragments of a solute molecule with solvent particles have been analyzed. Statistical features of the hydrogen bonding between different species were explored. Finally, we have obtained a self-diffusion coefficient of curcumin molecules in three model solvents.