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The zero-dipole summation method was extended to general molecular systems, and then applied to molecular dynamics simulations of an isotropic water system. In our previous paper [I. Fukuda, Y. Yonezawa, and H. Nakamura, J. Chem. Phys. 134, 164107 (2011)], for evaluating the electrostatic energy of a classical particle system, we proposed the zero-dipole summation method, which conceptually prevents the nonzero-charge and nonzero-dipole states artificially generated by a simple cutoff truncation. Here, we consider the application of this scheme to molecular systems, as well as some fundamental aspects of general cutoff truncation protocols. Introducing an idea to harmonize the bonding interactions and the electrostatic interactions in the scheme, we develop a specific algorithm. As in the previous study, the resulting energy formula is represented by a simple pairwise function sum, enabling facile applications to high-performance computation. The accuracy of the electrostatic energies calculated by the zero-dipole summation method with the atom-based cutoff was numerically investigated, by comparison with those generated by the Ewald method. We obtained an electrostatic energy error of less than 0.01% at a cutoff length longer than 13 Å for a TIP3P isotropic water system, and the errors were quite small, as compared to those obtained by conventional truncation methods. The static property and the stability in an MD simulation were also satisfactory. In addition, the dielectric constants and the distance-dependent Kirkwood factors were measured, and their coincidences with those calculated by the particle mesh Ewald method were confirmed, although such coincidences are not easily attained by truncation methods. We found that the zero damping-factor gave the best results in a practical cutoff distance region. In fact, in contrast to the zero-charge scheme, the damping effect was insensitive in the zero-charge and zero-dipole scheme, in the molecular system we treated. We discussed the origin of this difference between the two schemes and the dependence of this fact on the physical system. The use of the zero damping-factor will enhance the efficiency of practical computations, since the complementary error function is not employed. In addition, utilizing the zero damping-factor provides freedom from the parameter choice, which is not trivial in the zero-charge scheme, and eliminates the error function term, which corresponds to the time-consuming Fourier part under the periodic boundary conditions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

By decreasing the steepness of the repulsive wing in the intermolecular potential, one can extend the applicability of a water model to the high pressure region. Exploiting this trivial possibility, we published a polarizable model of water which provided good estimations not only of gas clusters, ambient liquid, hexagonal ice, but ice VII at very high pressures as well [A. Baranyai and P. Kiss, J. Chem. Phys. 133, 144109 (2010)]. This straightforward method works well provided the closest O-O distance is reasonably shorter in the high pressure phase than in hexagonal ice. If these O-O distances are close to each other and we fit the interactions to obtain an accurate picture of hexagonal ice, we underestimate the density of the high-pressure phases. This can be overcome if models use contracted molecules under high external pressure.In this paper we present a method, which is capable to describe the contraction of water molecules under high pressure by using two simple repulsion-attraction functions. These functions represent the dispersion interaction under low pressure and high pressure. The switch function varies between 0 and 1 and portions the two repulsions among the individual particles. The argument of the switch function is a virial-type expression, which can be interpreted as a net force compressing the molecule. We calculated the properties of gas clusters, densities, and internal energies of ambient water, hexagonal ice, ice III, ice VI, and ice VII phases and obtained excellent match of experimental data. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The anharmonic OH stretching vibrational frequencies, ν(OH), for the first-shell water molecules around the Li+, Ca2+, Mg2+, and Al3+ ions in dilute aqueous solutions have been calculated based on classical molecular dynamics (MD) simulations and quantum-mechanical (QM) calculations. For Li+(aq), Ca2+(aq), Mg2+(aq), and Al3+(aq), our calculated IR frequency shifts, Δν(OH), with respect to the gas-phase water frequency, are about -300, -350, -450, and -750 cm-1, compared to -290, -290, -420, and -830 cm-1 from experimental infrared (IR) studies. The agreement is thus quite good, except for the order between Li+ and Ca2+. Given that the polarizing field from the Ca2+ ion ought to be larger than that from Li+(aq), our calculated result seems reasonable. Also the absolute OH frequencies agree well with experiment. The method we used is a sequential four-step procedure: QM(electronic) to make a force field+MD simulation+QM(electronic) for point-charge-embedded Mn+ (H2O)ysecond shell (H2O)zthird shell clusters+QM(vibrational) to yield the OH spectrum. The many-body Ca2+-water force-field presented in this paper is new. IR intensity-weighting of the density-of-states frequency distributions was carried out by means of the squared dipole moment derivatives. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Coulombic interactions in molecular simulation are usually computed using the Ewald summation technique. This method is reliable for homogeneous and inhomogeneous systems but remarkably time consuming. This means a serious shortcoming in cases where unusually long simulation runs are necessary, for instance, during the calculation of interfacial properties, a subject of increasing interest. In homogeneous systems, the reaction field (RF) method can be alternatively used, reducing not only the computation time but also the difficulty of its implementation. However, it cannot be applied for inhomogeneous systems, at least from a strict formal point of view. In this paper, an analysis of the discrepancies in the computation of interfacial properties of water using the RF method is performed using constant volume biphasic Monte Carlo simulations, considering several of the most popular models available. The results show good quantitative agreement, within the simulation uncertainty, with the values obtained from the Ewald sums method. This result states the applicability of the RF method for interfacial properties calculation for this type of molecules. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We propose a very simple but “realistic” model of amphiphilic bilayers, simple enough to be able to include a large number of molecules in the sample but nevertheless detailed enough to include molecular charge distributions, flexible amphiphilic molecules, and a reliable model of water. All these parameters are essential in a nanoscopic scale study of intermolecular and long range electrostatic interactions. We also propose a novel, simple, and more accurate macroscopic electrostatic field for model bilayers. This model goes beyond the total dipole moment of the sample, which on a time average is zero for this type of symmetrical samples; i.e., it includes higher order moments of this macroscopic electric field. We show that by representing it with a superposition of Gaussians, it can be analytically integrated, and therefore its calculation is easily implemented in a molecular dynamics simulation (even in simulations of nonsymmetrical bi- or multilayers). In this paper we test our model by molecular dynamics simulations of Newton black films. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The phosphorylation effect on the small peptide conformation in water has not been clearly understood yet, despite the widely acknowledged notion that control of protein activity by phosphorylation works mainly by inducing conformational change. To elucidate the detailed mechanism, we performed infrared (IR) absorption and vibrational and electronic circular dichroism studies of both unphosphorylated and phosphorylated tetrapeptides, GSSS 1 and GSSpS 2. The solution structure of the tetrapeptide is found to be little dependent on the presence of the neutral or negatively charged phosphoryl group, and to be a mixture of extended structures including polyproline II (PII) and β-sheet conformations. The additional band at 1598 cm-1 in the amide I IR spectrum of the phosphorylated peptide GSSpS at neutral pD appears to be clear spectroscopic evidence for direct intramolecular hydrogen-bonding interaction between the side chain dianionic phosphoryl group and the backbone amide proton. On the basis of amide I IR band analyses, the authors found that the probability of finding the phosphoryl group strongly H bonded to the backbone proton in GSSpS is about 43% at pD 7.0 and 37 °C. Such a H-bonding interaction in GSSpS has the biological standard enthalpy and entropy of -15.1 kJ/mol and -51.2 J/K mol, respectively. Comparisons between the experimentally measured IR and VCD spectra and the numerically simulated ones suggested that the currently available force field parameters need to be properly modified. The results in this paper may shed light on an unknown mechanism of controlling the peptide conformation by phosphorylation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Structural properties of liquid water at ambient temperature were studied using Car-Parrinello [Phys. Rev. Lett. 55, 2471 (1985)] ab initio molecular dynamics (CPAIMD) simulations combined with the Kohn-Sham (KS) density functional theory and the BLYP exchange-correlation functional for the electronic structure. Unlike other recent work on the same subject, where plane-wave (PW) or hybrid Gaussian/plane-wave basis sets were employed, in the present paper, a discrete variable representation (DVR) basis set is used to expand the KS orbitals, so that with the real-space grid adapted in the present work, the properties of liquid water could be obtained very near the complete basis set limit. Structural properties of liquid water were extracted from a 30 ps CPAIMD-BLYP/DVR trajectory at 300 K. The radial distribution functions (RDFs), spatial distribution functions, and hydrogen bond geometry obtained from the CPAIMD-BLYP/DVR simulation are generally in good agreement with the most up to date experimental measurements. Compared to recent ab initio MD simulations based on PW basis sets, less significant overstructuring was found in the RDFs and the distributions of hydrogen bond angles, suggesting that previous plane-wave and Gaussian basis set calculations have exaggerated the tendency toward overstructuring. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We examine five different popular rigid water models (SPC, SPCE, TIP3P, TIP4P, and TIP5P) using molecular dynamics simulations in order to investigate the hydrophobic hydration and interaction of apolar Lennard-Jones solutes as a function of temperature in the range between 275 and 375 K along the 0.1 MPa isobar. For all investigated models and state points we calculate the excess chemical potential for the noble gases and methane employing the Widom particle insertion technique. All water models exhibit too small hydration entropies, but show a clear hierarchy. TIP3P shows poorest agreement with experiment, whereas TIP5P is closest to the experimental data at lower temperatures and SPCE is closest at higher temperatures. As a first approximation, this behavior can be rationalized as a temperature shift with respect to the solvation behavior found in real water. A rescaling procedure inspired by the information theory model of Hummer et al. [Chem. Phys. 258, 349 (2000)] suggests that the different solubility curves for the different models and real water can be largely explained on the basis of the different density curves at constant pressure. In addition, the models that give a good representation of the water structure at ambient conditions (TIP5P, SPCE, and TIP4P) show considerably better agreement with the experimental data than the ones which exhibit less structured O–O correlation functions (SPC and TIP3P). In the second part of the paper we calculate the hydrophobic interaction between xenon particles directly from a series of 60 ns simulation runs. We find that the temperature dependence of the association is to a large extent related to the strength of the solvation entropy. Nevertheless, differences between the models seem to require a more detailed molecular picture. The TIP5P model shows by far the strongest temperature dependence. The suggested density rescaling is also applied to the chemical potential in the xenon–xenon contact-pair configuration, indicating the presence of a temperature where the hydrophobic interaction turns into purely repulsive. The predicted association for xenon in real water suggests the presence of a strong variation with temperature, comparable to the behavior found for TIP5P water. Comparing different water models and experimental data we conclude that a proper description of density effects is an important requirement for a water model to account correctly for the correct description of the hydrophobic effects. A water model exhibiting a density maximum at the correct temperature is desirable. © 2004 American Institute of Physics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We apply first-principles molecular dynamics and static calculations in the study of several layers of water adsorbed at an oxide surface. Our aim is to bridge the gap between the well-explored monolayer and the complex, little-understood oxide–water interface by probing this middle ground where there is still contact with vacuum surface experiments. By examining coverages up to three monolayers on rutile TiO[sub 2](110) we emerge with three major conclusions. First, there is a trend with increasing coverage for water near the surface to become more molecular in nature, viz. the coordination of H to O for all near-surface molecules tends to lower values as the coverage increases. This means the hydroniumlike and other partially dissociated structures predicted up to 1.5 monolayers become less favorable as the coverage increases. Second, the templating influence of the surface disrupts the structure of the second and third layers at 3 ML coverage. Third, we can make a very satisfactory interpretation of experimental results (HREELS and TPD) gaining some new insights in the process. The assignment of TPD peaks to layer-by-layer desorption is shown to be open to question, as some second-layer molecules may contribute to the same peak as do those in the third layer. © 2003 American Institute of Physics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Coarse grained molecular dynamics simulations are presented in which the sensitivity of the ice nucleation rate to the hydrophilicity of a graphene nanoflake is investigated. We find that an optimal interaction strength for promoting ice nucleation exists, which coincides with that found previously for a face centered cubic (111) surface. We further investigate the role that the layering of interfacial water plays in heterogeneous ice nucleation and demonstrate that the extent of layering is not a good indicator of ice nucleating ability for all surfaces. Our results suggest that to be an efficient ice nucleating agent, a surface should not bind water too strongly if it is able to accommodate high coverages of water. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This special issue presents a series of papers that highlight a new and evolving view of water's molecular role in biological structure and dynamics. Increasingly water is appreciated for playing an active role in biological function rather than just serving as a spectator. The areas represented include molecular interfaces with water, biological self-assembly, conformational changes by macromolecules, and chemical reactivity [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this article we derive the effective pairwise interactions in a Langevin-type united atoms model of water. The interactions are determined from the trajectories of a detailed molecular dynamics simulation of simple point charge water. A standard method is used for estimating the conservative interaction, whereas a new “bottom-up” method is used to determine the effective dissipative and stochastic interactions. We demonstrate that when compared to the standard united atoms model, the transport properties of the coarse-grained model is significantly improved by the introduction of the derived dissipative and stochastic interactions. The results are compared to a previous study, where a “top-down” approach was used to obtain transport properties consistent with those of the simple point charge water model. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Quantitative free energy computation involves both using a model that is sufficiently faithful to the experimental system under study (accuracy) and establishing statistically meaningful measures of the uncertainties resulting from finite sampling (precision). In order to examine the accuracy of a range of common water models used for protein simulation for their solute/solvent properties, we calculate the free energy of hydration of 15 amino acid side chain analogs derived from the OPLS-AA parameter set with the TIP3P, TIP4P, SPC, SPC/E, TIP3P-MOD, and TIP4P-Ew water models. We achieve a high degree of statistical precision in our simulations, obtaining uncertainties for the free energy of hydration of 0.02–0.06 kcal/mol, equivalent to that obtained in experimental hydration free energy measurements of the same molecules. We find that TIP3P-MOD, a model designed to give improved free energy of hydration for methane, gives uniformly the closest match to experiment; we also find that the ability to accurately model pure water properties does not necessarily predict ability to predict solute/solvent behavior. We also evaluate the free energies of a number of novel modifications of TIP3P designed as a proof of concept that it is possible to obtain much better solute/solvent free energetic behavior without substantially negatively affecting pure water properties. We decrease the average error to zero while reducing the root mean square error below that of any of the published water models, with measured liquid water properties remaining almost constant with respect to our perturbations. This demonstrates there is still both room for improvement within current fixed-charge biomolecular force fields and significant parameter flexibility to make these improvements. Recent research in computational efficiency of free energy methods allows us to perform simulations on a local cluster that previously required large scale distributed computing, performing four times as much computational work in approximately a tenth of the computer time as a similar study a year ago. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Compares theoretical results for dynamical correlation functions characterizing collective excitations in liquid water with molecular dynamics simulation results performed on the same system. Validity and accuracy of the approximation scheme for memory functions; Dynamical correlation functions as faithful models.

Investigates collective excitations in liquid water using the recently developed theory for dynamics of molecular liquids. Interaction-site model for polyatomic fluids; Projector-operator formalism of Zwanzig and Mori; Approximation scheme for memory functions.

A microscopic model of lyotropic systems is presented. Amphiphile and water molecules are described by simple intermolecular potentials which correctly include important excluded volume effects and the relative energy scales in the system. The present model represents an attempt to bridge the gap between more primitive lattice models and highly complex all-atom descriptions of amphiphilic systems. A constant-temperature molecular dynamics study in which the divergence of the pressure tensor is constrained to zero is discussed. Preliminary calculations on the phase diagram, order parameters, and dynamical observables of the model are reported. Some comments on improvements to the model and the theoretical techniques used to study it are made in the final section of the paper. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We unravel the combined effects of confinement and surface interactions by studying the position dependent, time-resolved dynamic response functions in nano-containers of different shapes. Spectroscopic signatures are additionally studied through solvation dynamics by placing ionic and dipolar probes at varying distances from the enclosing surface. We find that the confined water molecules exhibit exotic dynamical features and stark differences from that in the bulk liquid. We employ atomistic molecular dynamics simulation to obtain the solvation time correlation function, non-Gaussian parameter, and non-linear response function that reveal the existence of heterogeneous and non-exponential dynamics with a strong sensitivity to both the size and the shape of the enclosure. Importantly, the slower long-time decay constant exhibits a non-monotonic spatial dependence. The initial ultrafast component is reminiscent of the same in the bulk, but it is found to have a different origin in the present systems. We perform shell-wise analyses to understand the microscopic origin of these observations and the range of the propagation of the surface induced effects. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We use molecular dynamics simulations to study the diffusion of water inside deformed carbon nanotubes with different degrees of deformation at 300 K. We found that the number of hydrogen bonds that water forms depends on nanotube topology, leading to enhancement or suppression of water diffusion. The simulation results reveal that more realistic nanotubes should be considered to understand the confined water diffusion behavior, at least for the narrowest nanotubes, when the interaction between water molecules and carbon atoms is relevant. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Molecular dynamics simulation of lipid bilayers generally uses all-atom, united-atom, and coarse-grained models of lipid molecules. The GROMOS united-atom model of lipid constructs a balance between accuracy and computational cost. The above-mentioned model satisfactorily reproduces many of the structural and dynamical properties of different lipid bilayers. However, the GROMOS force field is parameterized only with the SPC model of water. Unfortunately, SPC is not an excellent model of water for predicting the structure and dynamics of the interfacial water near the lipid bilayer. More advanced water models, such as TIP3P-FB and TIP4P-FB, outperform the SPC model in predicting different thermodynamic and microscopic properties of bulk water. This motivates us to check the compatibility of five different water models, including SPC, with the GROMOS96 53A6L united atom model of two different lipid bilayers, DPPC and POPC. A systematic comparison of the bilayer structure and dynamics, resulting from the simulations with different water models, is done. We find general agreement of the results for different water models with the experiment. In fact, the more advanced water models provide better agreement with the experiment. This study, therefore, helps in widening the range of choice of water models in simulating the lipid bilayer using the GROMOS united-atom model of the lipid molecules. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Molecular dynamics simulations are employed to investigate the structure of supercooled water (230 K) in contact with the (001), (010), and (100) surfaces of potassium feldspar (K-feldspar) in the microcline phase. Experimentally, K-feldspar and other feldspar minerals are known to be good ice-nucleating agents, which play a significant role in atmospheric science. Therefore, a principal purpose of this work is to evaluate the possibility that the K-feldspar surfaces considered could serve as likely sites for ice nucleation. The (001) and (010) surfaces were selected for study because they are perfect cleavage planes of feldspar, with (001) also being an easy cleavage plane. The (100) surface is considered because some experiments have suggested that it is involved in ice nucleation. Feldspar is modeled with the widely used CLAYFF force field, and the TIP4P/Ice model is employed for water. We do not observe ice nucleation on any of the K-feldspar surfaces considered; moreover, the density profiles and the structure of water near these surfaces do not exhibit any particularly icelike features. Our simulations indicate that these surfaces of K-feldspar are likely not responsible for its excellent ice nucleating ability. This suggests that one must look elsewhere, possibly at water-induced surface rearrangements or some other "defect" structure, for an explanation of ice nucleation by K-feldspar. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The purpose of this paper is threefold. First, we review the existing literature on flow rates of water in carbon nanotubes. Data for the slip length which characterizes the flow rate are scattered over 5 orders of magnitude for nanotubes of diameter 0.81-10 nm. Second, we precisely compute the slip length using equilibrium molecular dynamics (EMD) simulations, from which the interfacial friction between water and carbon nanotubes can be found, and also via external field driven non-equilibrium molecular dynamics simulations (NEMD). We discuss some of the issues in simulation studies which may be reasons for the large disagreements reported. By using the EMD method friction coefficient to determine the slip length, we overcome the limitations of NEMD simulations. In NEMD simulations, for each tube we apply a range of external fields to check the linear response of the fluid to the field and reliably extrapolate the results for the slip length to values of the field corresponding to experimentally accessible pressure gradients. Finally, we comment on several issues concerning water flow rates in carbon nanotubes which may lead to some future research directions in this area. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Terahertz laser VRT spectra of the water dimer consisting of 731 transitions measured with an average precision of 2 MHz and involving four (D[sub 2]O)[sub 2] intermolecular vibrations (one previously published) have been measured between 65 and 104 cm[sup -1]. The precisely determined energy level patterns differ both qualitatively and quantitatively from the predictions of several dimer potentials tested, and reveal an ordering of the intermolecular vibrations which differs dramatically from that predicted by standard normal mode analysis. Strong coupling is indicated between the low barrier tunneling motions and the intermolecular vibrations as well as among different vibrations. Particularly, the 83 cm[sup -1] (acceptor wag) and 90 cm[sup -1] (D[sub 2]O)[sub 2] (acceptor twist) vibrations interact through a Coriolis perturbation. These spectra provide the basis for our recent determination of the water pair potential. The corresponding data set for (H[sub 2]O)[sub 2] is presented in an accompanying paper. © 2000 American Institute of Physics. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The slow dynamics of glass-forming liquids is generally ascribed to the cage jump motion. In the cage jump picture, a molecule remains in a cage formed by neighboring molecules and, after a sufficiently long time, it jumps to escape from the original position by cage breaking. The clarification of the cage jump motion is therefore linked to unraveling the fundamental element of the slow dynamics. Here, we develop a cage jump model for the dynamics of supercooled water. The caged and jumping states of a water molecule are introduced with respect to the hydrogen-bond (H-bond) rearrangement process and describe the motion in supercooled states. It is then demonstrated from the molecular dynamics simulation of the TIP4P/2005 model that the characteristic length and time scales of cage jump motions provide a good description of the self-diffusion constant that is determined in turn from the long-time behavior of the mean square displacement. Our cage jump model thus enables the connection between H-bond dynamics and molecular diffusivity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Nonequilibrium molecular dynamics simulations are reported to investigate the influence of different atomistic water models on the predicted flow behavior in carbon nanotubes (CNTs) with diameters between 0.81 nm and 1.9 nm. The comparison was made using rigid three-site [simplified point charge (SPC), extended SPC (SCP/E), and transferable intermolecular potential three point (TIP3P)] and four-site (TIP4P and TIP4P/2005) models. In addition, a flexible three-site model (SPC/Fw) was also investigated. The effect of different simulation conditions was determined by generating a flux across the CNT using either a pressure gradient across a membrane separating two water reservoirs or a periodic CNT with a constant force applied to each water molecule. Simulations involving the two water reservoirs indicate that the flux is strongly dependent on the choice of water model, which confirms earlier work. By contrast, this strong model dependency is not a feature of the periodic CNT simulations. Instead, the flux depends mainly on the pore diameter and the molecular density of water inside the CNT. The influence of the water model becomes very small in the periodic CNT simulations, which eliminates distorting entrance/exit effects. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We use molecular dynamics to determine the mass accommodation coefficient (MAC) of water vapor molecules colliding with a rapidly moving liquid-vapor interface. This interface mimics those present in collapsing vapor bubbles that are characterized by large interfacial velocities. We find that at room temperature, the MAC is generally close to unity, and even with interfaces moving at 10 km/s velocity, it has a large value of 0.79. Using a simplified atomistic fluid model, we explore the consequences of vapor molecule interfacial collision rules on pressure, temperature, and density of a vapor subjected to an incoming high-velocity liquid-vapor interface. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Among the numerous anomalies of water, the acceleration of dynamics under pressure is particularly puzzling. Whereas the diffusivity anomaly observed in experiments has been reproduced in several computer studies, the parallel viscosity anomaly has received less attention. Here we simulate viscosity and the self-diffusion coefficient of the TIP4P/2005water model over a broad temperature and pressure range.We reproduce the experimental behavior and find additional anomalies at negative pressure. The anomalous effect of pressure on dynamic properties becomes more pronounced upon cooling, reaching two orders of magnitude for viscosity at 220 K.We analyze our results with a dynamic extension of a thermodynamic two-state model, an approach which has proved successful in describing experimental data. Water is regarded as a mixture of interconverting species with contrasting dynamic behaviors, one being strong (Arrhenius) and the other fragile (non-Arrhenius). The dynamic parameters of the two-state models are remarkably close between experiment and simulations. The larger pressure range accessible to simulations suggests a modification of the dynamic two-state model, which in turn also improves the agreement with experimental data. Furthermore, our simulations demonstrate the decoupling between viscosity η and self-diffusion coefficientDas a function of temperature T. The Stokes-Einstein relation, which predicts a constant Dη/T, is violated when T is lowered, in connection with the Widom line defined by an equal fraction of the two interconverting species. These results provide a unifying picture of thermodynamics and dynamics in water and call for experiments at negative pressure. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We introduce a general framework for constructing coarse-grained potential models without ad hoc approximations such as limiting the potential to two- and/or three-body contributions. The scheme, called the Deep Coarse-Grained Potential (abbreviated DeePCG), exploits a carefully crafted neural network to construct a many-body coarse-grained potential. The network is trained with full atomistic data in a way that preserves the natural symmetries of the system. The resulting model is very accurate and can be used to sample the configurations of the coarse-grained variables in a much faster way than with the original atomistic model. As an application, we consider liquid water and use the oxygen coordinates as the coarse-grained variables, starting from a full atomistic simulation of this system at the ab initio molecular dynamics level. We find that the two-body, three-body, and higher-order oxygen correlation functions produced by the coarse-grained and full atomistic models agree very well with each other, illustrating the effectiveness of the DeePCG model on a rather challenging task. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In a previous paper [P. Hamm and J. Savolainen, J. Chem. Phys. 136, 094516 (2012)], we have studied the 2D-Raman-THz response of liquid water, based on an all-atom molecular dynamics simulation. In the pulse sequence we investigated a near-infraredlaser pulse excites a vibrational coherence through a Raman process that switches it into another coherence by a THz pulse after some time, and finally read out by the emission of a THz field.In the present note, we explore the inverted time-ordered pulse sequence, in which the first coherence is generated by a direct THz excitation, while the switching of coherences is achieved by a Raman interaction. Since the dependence of the polarizibility on the nuclear coordinates is more nonlinear compared to that of the dipole moment, this pulse sequence reveals more of the couplings and correlations between the various degrees of freedom of water. Compared to 2D-Raman spectroscopy and the original pulse sequence, this pulse sequence reveals the clearest signature of a photon echo. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Using the molecular dynamics simulations with separate thermostats for translational and rotational degrees of freedom, we investigate the effects of water's rotational motion on the interaction among Lennard-Jones solutes. The situation with rotational temperature higher than the translational one (TR > TT) is mimicking the effects of microwaves on model solutions. Molecular dynamics simulations suggest that solutions of Lennard-Jones solutes become increasingly more structured with the rise in TR, while keeping the TT constant. This is evidenced by an increase of the first and the second peak of the solute-solute radial distribution function. In addition, the first peak moves toward slightly larger distances; the effect seems to be caused by the destabilization of water molecules in the first hydration shell around hydrophobic solutes. More evidence of strong effects of the rotationally excited water is provided by the simulations of short hydrophobic polymers, which upon an increase in TR assume more compact conformations. In these simulations, we see the re-distribution of water molecules, which escape from hydrophobic "pockets" to better solvate the solvent exposed monomers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The aqueous hydrogen molecule is studied with molecular dynamics simulations at ambient temperature and pressure conditions, using a newly developed flexible and polarizable H2 molecule model. The design and implementation of this model, compatible with an existing flexible and polarizable force field for water, is presented in detail. The structure of the hydration layer suggests that first-shell water molecules accommodate the H2 molecule without major structural distortions and two-dimensional, radial-angular distribution functions indicate that as opposed to strictly tangential, the orientation of these water molecules is such that the solute is solvated with one of the free electron pairs of H2O. The calculated self-diffusion coefficient of H2(aq) agrees very well with experimental results and the time dependence of mean square displacement suggests the presence of caging on a time scale corresponding to hydrogen bond network vibrations in liquid water. Orientational correlation function of H2 experiences an extremely short-scale decay, making the H2-H2O interaction potential essentially isotropic by virtue of rotational averaging. The inclusion of explicit polarizability in the model allows for the calculation of Raman spectra that agree very well with available experimental data on H2(aq) under differing pressure conditions, including accurate reproduction of the experimentally noted trends with solute pressure or concentration. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We examine the thermal fluctuations of the local electric field Elock and the dipole moment μk in liquid water at T = 298 K between metal walls in electric field applied in the perpendicular direction. We use analytic theory and molecular dynamics simulation. In this situation, there is a global electrostatic coupling between the surface charges on the walls and the polarization in the bulk. Then, the correlation function of the polarization density pz(r) along the applied field contains a homogeneous part inversely proportional to the cell volume V. Accounting for the long-range dipolar interaction, we derive the Kirkwood-Fröhlich formula for the polarization fluctuations when the specimen volume v is much smaller than V. However, for not small v/V, the homogeneous part comes into play in dielectric relations. We also calculate the distribution of |Elock| in applied field. As a unique feature of water, its magnitude |Elock| obeys a Gaussian distribution with a large mean value E0 ≅ 17 V/nm, which arises mainly from the surrounding hydrogen-bonded molecules. Since |μk|E0 ∼ 30kBT, μk becomes mostly parallel to Eloc k. As a result, the orientation distributions of these two vectors nearly coincide, assuming the classical exponential form. In dynamics, the component of μk(t) parallel to Eloc k(t) changes on the time scale of the hydrogen bonds ∼5 ps, while its smaller perpendicular component undergoes librational motions on time scales of 0.01 ps. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Interfacial water structures have been studied intensively by probing the O-H stretch mode of water molecules using sum-frequency generation (SFG) spectroscopy. This surface-specific technique is finding increasingly widespread use, and accordingly, computational approaches to calculate SFG spectra using molecular dynamics (MD) trajectories of interfacial water molecules have been developed and employed to correlate specific spectral signatures with distinct interfacial water structures. Such simulations typically require relatively long (several nanoseconds) MD trajectories to allow reliable calculation of the SFG response functions through the dipole moment-polarizability time correlation function. These long trajectories limit the use of computationally expensive MD techniques such as ab initio MD and centroid MD simulations. Here, we present an efficient algorithm determining the SFG response from the surface-specific velocity-velocity correlation function (ssVVCF). This ssVVCF formalism allows us to calculate SFG spectra using a MD trajectory of only ~100 ps, resulting in the substantial reduction of the computational costs, by almost an order of magnitude. We demonstrate that the O-H stretch SFG spectra at the water-air interface calculated by using the ssVVCF formalism well reproduce those calculated by using the dipole moment-polarizability time correlation function. Furthermore, we applied this ssVVCF technique for computing the SFG spectra from the ab initio MD trajectories with various density functionals. We report that the SFG responses computed from both ab initio MD simulations and MD simulations with an ab initio based force field model do not show a positive feature in its imaginary component at 3100 cm-1. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We perform direct large molecular dynamics simulations of homogeneous SPC/E water nucleation, using up to ~4 · 106 molecules. Our large system sizes allow us to measure extremely low and accurate nucleation rates, down to ~1019 cm-3 s-1, helping close the gap between experimentally measured rates ~1017 cm-3 s-1. We are also able to precisely measure size distributions, sticking efficiencies, cluster temperatures, and cluster internal densities. We introduce a new functional form to implement the Yasuoka-Matsumoto nucleation rate measurement technique (threshold method). Comparison to nucleation models shows that classical nucleation theory over-estimates nucleation rates by a few orders of magnitude. The semi-phenomenological nucleation model does better, under-predicting rates by at worst a factor of 24. Unlike what has been observed in Lennard-Jones simulations, post-critical clusters have temperatures consistent with the run average temperature. Also, we observe that post-critical clusters have densities very slightly higher, ~5%, than bulk liquid. We re-calibrate a Hale-type J vs. S scaling relation using both experimental and simulation data, finding remarkable consistency in over 30 orders of magnitude in the nucleation rate range and 180 K in the temperature range. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Liquid water is known to reorient via a combination of large angular jumps (due to exchange of hydrogen bonding (H-bond) partners) and diffusive orientations. Translation of the molecule undergoing the orientational jump and its initial and final H-bond acceptors plays a key role in the microscopic reorientation process. Here, we partition the translational dynamics into those occurring during intervals when rotating water molecules (and their initial and final H-bonding partners) undergo orientational jump and those arising when molecules wait between consecutive orientational jumps. These intervals are chosen in such a way that none of the four possible H-bonds involving the chosen water molecule undergo an exchange process within its duration. Translational dynamics is analysed in terms of the distribution of particle displacements, van Hove functions, and its moments. We observe that the translational dynamics, calculated from molecular dynamics simulations of liquid water, is fastest during the orientational jumps and slowest during periods of waiting. The translational dynamics during all temporal intervals shows an intermediate behaviour. This is the microscopic origin of temporal dynamic heterogeneity in liquid water, which is mild at 300 K and systematically increases with supercooling. Study of such partitioned dynamics in supercooled water shows increased disparity in dynamics occurring in the two different types of intervals. Nature of the distribution of particle displacements in supercooled water is investigated and it reveals signatures non-Gaussian behaviour. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We report the development of a united AMOEBA (uAMOEBA) polarizable water model, which is computationally 3-5 times more efficient than the three-site AMOEBA03 model in molecular dynamics simulations while providing comparable accuracy for gas-phase and liquid properties. In this coarse-grained polarizable water model, both electrostatic (permanent and induced) and van der Waals representations have been reduced to a single site located at the oxygen atom. The permanent charge distribution is described via the molecular dipole and quadrupole moments and the many-body polarization via an isotropic molecular polarizability, all located at the oxygen center. Similarly, a single van der Waals interaction site is used for each water molecule. Hydrogen atoms are retained only for the purpose of defining local frames for the molecular multipole moments and intramolecular vibrational modes. The parameters have been derived based on a combination of ab initio quantum mechanical and experimental data set containing gas-phase cluster structures and energies, and liquid thermodynamic properties. For validation, additional properties including dimer interaction energy, liquid structures, self-diffusion coefficient, and shear viscosity have been evaluated. The results demonstrate good transferability from the gas to the liquid phase over a wide range of temperatures, and from nonpolar to polar environments, due to the presence of molecular polarizability. The water coordination, hydrogen-bonding structure, and dynamic properties given by uAMOEBA are similar to those derived from the all-atom AMOEBA03 model and experiments. Thus, the current model is an accurate and efficient alternative for modeling water. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Vibrational spectroscopy of the water bending mode has been investigated experimentally to study the structure of water in condensed phases. In the present work, we calculate the theoretical infrared (IR) and sum-frequency generation (SFG) spectra of the HOH bend in liquid water and at the water liquid/vapor interface using a mixed quantum/classical approach. Classical molecular dynamics simulation is performed by using a recently developed water model that explicitly includes three-body interactions and yields a better description of the water surface. Ab-initio-based transition frequency, dipole, polarizability, and intermolecular coupling maps are developed for the spectral calculations. The calculated IR and SFG spectra show good agreement with the experimental measurements. In the theoretical imaginary part of the SFG susceptibility for the water liquid/vapor interface, we find two features: a negative band centered at 1615 cm-1 and a positive band centered at 1670 cm-1. We analyze this spectrum in terms of the contributions from molecules in different hydrogen-bond classes to the SFG spectral density and also compare to SFG results for the OH stretch. SFG of the water bending mode provides a complementary picture of the heterogeneous hydrogen-bond configurations at the water surface. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Water in confining geometries shows various anomalous properties related to its structure and dynamics compared with bulk water. Here, the dielectric constant of water as a function of separation in a graphite slab geometry was studied using molecular dynamics simulations. The dielectric constants of water were calculated from the orientational polarization of water molecules when an external electric field was applied parallel and normal to the slabs. The reduction of the dielectric constant of water compared with bulk water can be explained by investigating the structure and dynamics of water in slab geometries. We found a preferred orientation of water molecules in the layer closest to the graphite surface. The self-diffusion coefficient distribution of water molecules along the direction normal to the slabs was also computed. Highly mobile water molecules in the intermediate region were generated by the weak hydrogen bonding produced by the preferred orientation of water molecules in the layer. We concluded that the dielectric constant of water in the slab geometry is lower than that of bulk water because of the reduction of the polarization of water and the highly mobile water molecules in the intermediate region arising from the preferred orientation of water molecules. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Estimating the relative stabilities of different conformational states of a (bio-)molecule using molecular dynamics simulations involves two challenging problems: the conceptual problem of how to define the states of interest and the technical problem of how to properly sample these states, along with achieving a sufficient number of interconversion transitions. In this study, the two issues are addressed in the context of a decaalanine peptide in water, by considering the 310-, α-, and π-helical states. The simulations rely on the ball-and-stick local-elevation umbrella-sampling (B&S-LEUS) method. In this scheme, the states are defined as hyperspheres (balls) in a (possibly high dimensional) collective-coordinate space and connected by hypercylinders (sticks) to ensure transitions. A new object, the pipe, is also introduced here to handle curvilinear pathways. Optimal sampling within the so-defined space is ensured by confinement and (one-dimensional) memory-based biasing potentials associated with the three different kinds of objects. The simulation results are then analysed in terms of free energies using reweighting, possibly relying on two distinct sets of collective coordinates for the state definition and analysis. The four possible choices considered for these sets are Cartesian coordinates, hydrogen-bond distances, backbone dihedral angles, or pairwise sums of successive backbone dihedral angles. The results concerning decaalanine underline that the concept of conformational state may be extremely ambiguous, and that its tentative absolute definition as a free-energy basin remains subordinated to the choice of a specific analysis space. For example, within the force-field employed and depending on the analysis coordinates selected, the 310-helical state may refer to weakly overlapping collections of conformations, differing by as much as 25 kJ mol-1 in terms of free energy. As another example, the π-helical state appears to correspond to a free-energy basin for three choices of analysis coordinates, but to be unstable with the fourth one. The problem of conformational-state definition may become even more intricate when comparison with experiment is involved, where the state definition relies on spectroscopic or functional observables. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Pressure, density, and temperature data for H2O were obtained up to 260 GPa by using laser-driven shock compression technique. The shock compression technique combined with the diamond anvil cell was used to assess the equation of state models for the P-ρ-T conditions for both the principal Hugoniot and the off-Hugoniot states. The contrast between the models allowed for a clear assessment of the equation of state models. Our P-ρ-T data totally agree with those of the model based on quantum molecular dynamics calculations. These facts indicate that this model is adopted as the standard for modeling interior structures of Neptune, Uranus, and exoplanets in the liquid phase in the multi-Mbar range. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

First principles theoretical studies of vibrational spectral diffusion of the stretch modes of water and azide (N3-) ions are presented by means of ab initio molecular dynamics simulations for two different concentrations of the ions. The vibrational spectral diffusion of hydration shell water in a dilute solution containing a single azide ion is found to occur with three time scales while two time scales are found for the spectral diffusion in the solution of higher ion concentration. The frequency time correlation of the stretching vibration of azide ion is also found to have two time scales. The vibrational spectral diffusion of the stretching mode of azide ions in the concentrated solution is found to occur at a slightly faster rate while that of the water OD modes becomes slower with increase of ion concentration. The effects of dispersion interactions are also investigated by using a dispersion corrected density functional. The time constants of frequency correlations and dynamical spectral shifts are analyzed in terms of the relaxation of azide ion-water and water-water hydrogen bonds. The results of present theoretical calculations are compared with the available experimental and other theoretical results. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although liquid water is ubiquitous in chemical reactions at roots of life and climate on the earth, the prediction of its properties by high-level ab initio molecular dynamics simulations still represents a formidable task for quantum chemistry. In this article, we present a room temperature simulation of liquid water based on the potential energy surface obtained by a many-body wave function through quantum Monte Carlo (QMC) methods. The simulated properties are in good agreement with recent neutron scattering and X-ray experiments, particularly concerning the position of the oxygen-oxygen peak in the radial distribution function, at variance of previous density functional theory attempts. Given the excellent performances of QMC on large scale supercomputers, this work opens new perspectives for predictive and reliable ab initio simulations of complex chemical systems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The test-area (TA) perturbation approach has been gaining popularity as a methodology for the direct computation of the interfacial tension in molecular simulation. Though originally implemented for planar interfaces, the TA approach has also been used to analyze the interfacial properties of curved liquid interfaces. Here, we provide an interpretation of the TA method taking the view that it corresponds to the change in free energy under a transformation of the spatial metric for an affine distortion. By expressing the change in configurational energy of a molecular configuration as a Taylor expansion in the distortion parameter, compact relations are derived for the interfacial tension and its energetic and entropic components for three different geometries: planar, cylindrical, and spherical fluid interfaces. While the tensions of the planar and cylindrical geometries are characterized by first-order changes in the energy, that of the spherical interface depends on second-order contributions. We show that a greater statistical uncertainty is to be expected when calculating the thermodynamic properties of a spherical interface than for the planar and cylindrical cases, and the evaluation of the separate entropic and energetic contributions poses a greater computational challenge than the tension itself. The methodology is employed to determine the vapour-liquid interfacial tension of TIP4P/2005 water at 293 K by molecular dynamics simulation for planar, cylindrical, and spherical geometries. A weak peak in the curvature dependence of the tension is observed in the case of cylindrical threads of condensed liquid at a radius of about 8 Å, below which the tension is found to decrease again. In the case of spherical drops, a marked decrease in the tension from the planar limit is found for radii below - 15 Å; there is no indication of a maximum in the tension with increasing curvature. The vapour-liquid interfacial tension tends towards the planar limit for large system sizes for both the cylindrical and spherical cases. Estimates of the entropic and energetic contributions are also evaluated for the planar and cylindrical geometries and their magnitudes are in line with the expectations of our simple analysis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The surface activity of a typical surfactant, octanoic acid (OA), in ethanol-water solutions is investigated with a combined experimental and molecular simulation approach. The experiments show that OA reduces the surface tension of ethanol-water solutions at low ethanol concentration, but the effectiveness decreases with increasing ethanol concentration and vanishes for ethanol concentrations above 60%. Molecular dynamics simulations are used to obtain free energy landscapes for OA as a function of the distance from the surface. The free energy driving force pushing OA to the surface decreases with increasing ethanol concentration, and becomes insignificant (i.e., less than kT) for ethanol concentrations above 70%. Thus, the decrease in the effectiveness of OA in reducing the surface tension at higher ethanol concentrations can be attributed to the decrease in the free energy driving force keeping OA at the surface. We expect these results to apply generally to hydrocarbon-based surfactants. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Generalized-gradient approximations (GGAs) of density-functional theory can suffer from substantial many-body errors in molecular systems interacting through weak non-covalent forces. Here, the errors of a range of GGAs for the 3-body energies of trimers of rare gases and water are investigated. The patterns of 3-body errors are similar for all the systems, and are related to the form of the exchange-enhancement factor FX(x) at large reduced gradient x, which also governs 2-body exchange-overlap errors. However, it is shown that the 3-body and 2-body errors depend in opposite ways on FX(x), so that they tend to cancel in molecular aggregates. Embedding arguments are used to achieve a partial separation of contributions to 3-body error from polarization, non-local correlation, and exchange, and it emerges that exchange is a major contributor. The practical importance of beyond-2-body errors is illustrated by the energetics of the water hexamer. An analysis of exchangeenergy distributions is used to elucidate why 2-body and 3-body errors of GGAs depend in opposite ways on FX(x). The relevance of the present analysis to a range of other molecular systems is noted. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Using extensive equilibrium molecular dynamics simulations we determine the dielectric spectra of aqueous solutions of NaF, NaCl, NaBr, and NaI. The ion-specific and concentration-dependent shifts of the static dielectric constants and the dielectric relaxation times match experimental results very well, which serves as a validation of the classical and non-polarizable ionic force fields used. The purely ionic contribution to the dielectric response is negligible, but determines the conductivity of the salt solutions. The ion-water cross correlation contribution is negative and reduces the total dielectric response by about 5%-10% for 1 M solutions. The dominating water dielectric response is decomposed into different water solvation shells and ion-pair configurations, by this the spectral blue shift and the dielectric decrement of salt solutions with increasing salt concentration is demonstrated to be primarily caused by first-solvation shell water. With rising salt concentration the simulated spectra show more pronounced deviations from a single-Debye form and can be well described by a Cole-Cole fit, in quantitative agreement with experiments. Our spectral decomposition into ionic and different water solvation shell contributions does not render the individual contributions more Debye-like, this suggests the non-Debye-like character of the dielectric spectra of salt solutions not to be due to the superposition of different elementary relaxation processes with different relaxation times. Rather, the non-Debye-like character is likely to be an inherent spectral signature of solvation water around ions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recently, two-dimensional (2D) THz-Raman spectroscopy has been used to investigate the intermolecular modes of liquid water. We examine such 2D spectroscopy signals by means of full molecular dynamics (MD) simulations. In this way, we carry out a detailed analysis of intermolecular interactions that play an essential role in many important chemical processes. We calculate 2D Raman-THz-THz (RTT), THz-Raman-THz (TRT), and 2D Raman signals for liquid water, methanol, formamide, acetonitrile, formaldehyde, and dimethyl sulfoxide using an equilibriumnon- equilibrium hybrid MD simulation algorithm originally developed for 2D Raman spectroscopy. These signals are briefly analyzed in terms of anharmonicity and nonlinear polarizability of vibrational modes on the basis of the 2D Raman signals calculated from a Brownian oscillator model with a nonlinear system-bath interaction. We find that the anharmonic contribution is dominant in the RTT case, while the nonlinear polarizability contribution is dominant in the TRT case. For water and methanol, we observed vibrational echo peaks of librational motion in the 2D TRT signals. The predicted signal profiles and intensities that we obtained provide valuable information that can be applied to 2D spectroscopy experiments, allowing them to be carried out more efficiently. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In order to investigate proton transfer reaction in solution, mixed quantum-classical molecular dynamics calculations have been carried out based on our previously proposed quantum equation of motion for the reacting system [A. Yamada and S. Okazaki, J. Chem. Phys. 128, 044507 (2008)]. Surface hopping method was applied to describe forces acting on the solvent classical degrees of freedom. In a series of our studies, quantum and solvent effects on the reaction dynamics in solutions have been analysed in detail. Here, we report our mixed quantum-classical molecular dynamics calculations for intramolecular proton transfer of malonaldehyde in water. Thermally activated proton transfer process, i.e., vibrational excitation in the reactant state followed by transition to the product state and vibrational relaxation in the product state, as well as tunneling reaction can be described by solving the equation of motion. Zero point energy is, of course, included, too. The quantum simulation in water has been compared with the fully classical one and the wave packet calculation in vacuum. The calculated quantum reaction rate in water was 0.70 ps-1, which is about 2.5 times faster than that in vacuum, 0.27ps-1. This indicates that the solvent water accelerates the reaction. Further, the quantum calculation resulted in the reaction rate about 2 times faster than the fully classical calculation, which indicates that quantum effect enhances the reaction rate, too. Contribution from three reaction mechanisms, i.e., tunneling, thermal activation, and barrier vanishing reactions, is 33:46:21 in the mixed quantum-classical calculations. This clearly shows that the tunneling effect is important in the reaction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this work, we report the results of a series of density functional theory (DFT) based ab initio molecular dynamics (AIMD) simulations of ambient liquid water using a hierarchy of exchangecorrelation (XC) functionals to investigate the individual and collective effects of exact exchange (Exx), via the PBE0 hybrid functional, non-local van der Waals/dispersion (vdW) interactions, via a fully self-consistent density-dependent dispersion correction, and an approximate treatment of nuclear quantum effects, via a 30 K increase in the simulation temperature, on the microscopic structure of liquid water. Based on these AIMD simulations, we found that the collective inclusion of Exx and vdW as resulting from a large-scale AIMD simulation of (H2O)128 significantly softens the structure of ambient liquid water and yields an oxygen-oxygen structure factor, SOO(Q), and corresponding oxygen-oxygen radial distribution function, gOO(r), that are now in quantitative agreement with the best available experimental data. This level of agreement between simulation and experiment demonstrated herein originates from an increase in the relative population of water molecules in the interstitial region between the first and second coordination shells, a collective reorganization in the liquid phase which is facilitated by a weakening of the hydrogen bond strength by the use of a hybrid XC functional, coupled with a relative stabilization of the resultant disordered liquid water configurations by the inclusion of non-local vdW/dispersion interactions. This increasingly more accurate description of the underlying hydrogen bond network in liquid water also yields higher-order correlation functions, such as the oxygen-oxygen-oxygen triplet angular distribution, POOO(θ), and therefore the degree of local tetrahedrality, as well as electrostatic properties, such as the effective molecular dipole moment, that are in much better agreement with experiment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We present an analysis of the dipolar correlations in water as a function of temperature and density and in the presence of simple ionic solutes, carried out using molecular dynamics simulations and empirical potentials. We show that the dipole-dipole correlation function of the liquid exhibits sizable oscillations over nanodomains of about 1.5 nm radius, with several isosbestic points as a function of temperature; the size of the nanodomains is nearly independent on temperature and density, between 240 and 400 K and 0.9 and 1.3 g/cm³, but it is substantially affected by the presence of solvated ions. In the same range of thermodynamic conditions, the decay time (T ) of the system dipole moment varies by a factor of about 30 and 1.5, as a function of temperature and density, respectively. At 300 K, we observed a maximum in T as a function of density, and a corresponding shallow maximum in the tetrahedral order parameter, in a range where the diffusion coefficient, the pressure and the dielectric constant increase monotonically. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Molecular dynamics simulations are used to investigate why external electric fields promote the freezing of liquid water models. It is shown that the melting point of water at a pressure of 1 bar increases significantly when water is polarized by a uniform field. Fields of 1 V/nm and 2 V/nm increase the melting point by 24 K and 44 K, respectively. The increased melting point is mainly due to the favorable interaction of near perfectly polarized cubic ice with the applied field. For a fixed temperature, we demonstrate that the size of the critical ice nucleus decreases with field strength, mostly because the melting point, and hence the true degree of supercooling, is increasing with field. On simulation timescales, ice nucleation is observed at ~40 K below the field-dependent melting point, independent of the particular value of the field applied. Indeed, we find that even quite highly polarized liquid water retains the characteristic local structures, and the related anomalous properties of water. Our results are obviously relevant to the mechanism of heterogeneous ice nucleation by local surface fields. Local fields will effectively increase the degree of supercooling of locally polarized liquid, decreasing the size of the critical nucleus in the region influenced by the field, hence facilitating ice nucleation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]