Ab Initio Molecular Dynamics Study of Alignment-Resolved O2 Scattering from Highly Oriented Pyrolytic Graphite

A high dimensional and accurate atomistic neural network potential energy surface (ANN-PES) that describes the interaction between one O2 molecule and a highly oriented pyrolytic graphite (HOPG) surface has been constructed using the open-source package (aenet). The validation of the PES is performed by paying attention to static characteristics as well as by testing its performance in reproducing previous ab initio molecular dynamics simulation results. Subsequently, the ANN-PES is used to perform quasi-classical molecular dynamics calculations of the alignment-dependent scattering of O2 from HOPG. The results are obtained for 200 meV O2 molecules with different initial alignments impinging with a polar incidence angle with respect to the surface normal of 22.5° on a thermalized (110 and 300 K) graphite surface. The choice of these initial conditions in our simulations is made to perform comparisons to recent experimental results on this system. Our results show that the scattering of O2 from the HOPG surface is a rather direct process, that the angular distributions are alignment dependent, and that the final translational energy of end-on molecules is around 20% lower than that of side-on molecules. Upon collision with the surface, the molecules that are initially aligned perpendicular to the surface become highly rotationally excited, whereas a very small change in the rotational state of the scattered molecules is observed for the initial parallel alignments. The latter confirms the energy transfer dependence on the stereodynamics for the present system. The results of our simulations are in overall agreement with the experimental observations regarding the shape of the angular distributions and the alignment dependence of the in-plane reflected molecules.

Time-resolved "pump-probe" ab initio molecular dynamics studies are constructed to probe the stability of reaction intermediates, the mechanism of energy transfer, and energy repartitioning, for moieties involved during the interaction of volatile organic compunds with hydroxyl radical. These systems are of prime importance in the atmosphere. Specifically, the stability of reaction intermediates of hydroxyl radical adducts to isoprene and butadiene molecules is used as a case study to develop novel computational techniques involving "pump-probe" ab initio molecular dynamics. Starting with the various possible hydroxyl radical adducts to isoprene and butadiene, select vibrational modes of each of the adducts are populated with excess energy to mimic the initial conditions of an experiment. The flow of energy into the remaining modes is then probed by subjecting the excited adducts to ab initio molecular dynamics simulations. It is found that the stability of the adducts arises directly due to the anhormonically driven coupling of the modes to facilitate repartitioning of the excess vibrational energy. This kind of vibrational repartitioning has a critical influence on the energy density.

We present the absolute enthalpy, entropy, heat capacity, and free energy of liquid water at ambient conditions calculated by the two-phase thermodynamic method applied to ab initio, reactive and classical molecular dynamics simulations. We find that the absolute entropy and heat capacity of liquid water from ab initio molecular dynamics (AIMD) is underestimated, but falls within the range of the flexible empirical as well as the reactive force fields. The origin of the low absolute entropy of liquid water from AIMD simulations is due to an underestimation of the translational entropy by 20% and the rotational entropy by 40% compared to the TIP3P classical water model, consistent with previous studies that reports low diffusivity and increased ordering of liquid water from AIMD simulations. Classical MD simulations with rigid water models tend to be in better agreement with experiment (in particular TIP3P yielding the best agreement), although the TIP4P-ice water model, the only empirical force field that reproduces the experimental melting temperature, has the lowest entropy, perhaps expectedly. This reiterates the limitations of existing empirical water models in simultaneously capturing the thermodynamics of solid and liquid phases. We find that the quantum corrections to heat capacity of water can be as large as 60%. Although certain water models are computed to yield good absolute free energies of water compared to experiments, they are often due to the fortuitous enthalpy-entropy cancellation, but not necessarily due to the correct descriptions of enthalpy and entropy separately.

An ab initio molecular dynamics exploration of associates in Ba-Bi liquid with strong ordering trends

We examine the effect of equilibration methodology and sampling on ab initio molecular dynamics (AIMD) simulations of systems of common solvents and salts found in lithium-oxygen batteries. We compare two equilibration methods: (1) using an AIMD temperature ramp and (2) using a classical MD simulation followed by a short AIMD simulation both at the target simulation temperature of 300 K. We also compare two different classical all-atom force fields: PCFF+ and OPLS. By comparing the simulated association/dissociation behavior of lithium salts in different solvents with the experimental behavior, we find that equilibration with the classical force field that produces more physically accurate behavior in the classical MD simulations, namely, OPLS, also results in more physically accurate behavior in the AIMD runs compared to equilibration with PCFF+ or with the AIMD temperature ramp. Equilibration with OPLS outperforms even the pure AIMD equilibration because the classical MD equilibration is much longer than the AIMD equilibration (nanosecond vs picosecond timescales). These longer classical simulations allow the systems to find a more physically accurate initial configuration, and in the short simulation times available for the AIMD production runs, the initial configuration has a large impact on the system behavior. We also demonstrate the importance of averaging coordination number over multiple starting configurations and Li+ ions, as the majority of Li+ ions do not undergo a single association or dissociation event even in an ∼40 ps long simulation and thus do not sample a statistically significant portion of the phase space. These results show the importance of both equilibration method and sufficient independent sampling for extracting experimentally relevant quantities from AIMD simulations.

In the paper, the ORR/OER on graphene-supported nitrogen coordinated Ru-atom (Ru-N-C) is simulated. We discuss nitrogen coordination influences electronic properties, adsorption energies, and catalytic activity in a single-atom Ru active site. The over potentials on Ru-N-C are 1.12 eV/1.00 eV for ORR/OER. We calculate Gibbs-free energy (ΔG) for every reaction step in ORR/OER process. In order to gain a deeper understanding of the catalytic process on the surface of single atom catalysts, the ab initio molecular dynamics (AIMD) simulations show that Ru-N-C has a structural stability at 300 K and that ORR/OER on Ru-N-C can occur along a typical four-electron process of reaction. AIMD simulations of catalytic processes provide detailed information about atom interactions. In this paper, we use density functional theory (DFT) with PBE functional to study the electronic properties and adsorption properties of graphene-supported nitrogen coordinated Ru-atom (Ru-N-C) Gibbs-free energy and Gibbs-free energy for very reaction step. The structural optimization and all the calculations are carried out by Dmol3 package, adopting the PNT basis set and DFT semicore pseudopotential. Ab initio molecular dynamics simulations (AIMD) were run for 10 ps. The canonical (NVT) ensemble, massive GGM thermostat, and a temperature of 300 K are taken into account. The functional of B3LYP and the DNP basis set are chosen for AIMD.

Ab initio molecular dynamics studies on effect of Zr on oxidation resistance of TiAlN coatings

Ab initio molecular dynamics simulations have been performed to study the effects of different temperatures on the structure and stability of energetic solid silver azide. The results indicate that the N–N bond fission takes place at 523 K. The azide sublattice structure broke down prior to the silver sublattice. The initiation decomposition of silver azide is triggered by the N–N bond breaking. This will initiate many decomposition reactions and produce many nitrogen radicals, N2, and silver clusters. Silver azide has metallic properties at 573 K. As the temperature increases, its sensitivity becomes more and more sensitive. The calculated power spectra of the velocity autocorrelation function show that the low-frequency vibrational modes become more prominent than the high-frequency ones with increasing temperature. This would allow low-frequency vibrations and rotations to occur more freely than in the solid.

An ab initio molecular dynamics simulations have been carried out for the dissociative recombination reaction of the deuterium-substituted hydronium cation, HD2O+ + e −, at the state-averaged multiconfigurational self-consistent field level. In the present simulations, five electronic states of HD2O were included explicitly, and nonadiabatic transitions among adiabatic electronic states were taken into account by the Tully’s fewest switches algorithm. It is shown that the dominant products, OD + D + H, were generated in 63% of trajectories, while the products, OH + 2D, were generated in only 11% of trajectories, indicating that the release of a light fragment H is favored over the release of a heavy fragment D. This result is in conformity with the observation that there is a larger amount of deuterium substituted species than the non-substituted species in the interstellar space.

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The Al13 polymer, Al13O4(OH)24(H2O)12Cl7, is thought to be a major component of the aluminum chlorohydrate (ACH) polymer system. Although it plays important roles in various aluminum chlorohydrate applications, its structure is not well understood. We combine ab initio molecular dynamics simulations in both the gas-phase and aqueous solution, with small angle X-ray scattering experiments on a bulk ACH sample to determine the structure of Al13-mer. We find that Al13 entity is roughly spherical (∼10 Å diameter), with a central tetrahedral Al3+ ion surrounded by four shells consisting of O, OH and H2O groups. Our ab initio molecular dynamics studies indicate that such a structure is stable on the picosecond time scale in an aqueous environment.

We report an ab initio molecular dynamics simulation study of a complex composed of the superoxide anion and four water molecules. We probe the symmetry and stability of the superoxide tetrahydrate anion cluster at a low temperature (25 K) where there are vibrational spectra and a higher temperature (111 K) where experimental data are not available. From the ab initio simulation trajectory, we found the superoxide tetrahydrate complex to be highly symmetric, exhibiting a collective breathing motion on the picosecond time scale at low temperature that subsequently disappears at higher temperatures. Furthermore, we establish that superoxide tetrahydrate is a highly stable species at the higher temperature with little or no distortion to its geometry. The vibrational spectrum calculated from our ab initio trajectory is in reasonable agreement with experimental spectra, and we were able to assign individual peaks in the spectra to specific modes in the superoxide tetrahydrate anion cluster.

The 70Li2S-30P2S5 glass is a promising solid-state electrolyte for all solid-state lithium-ion batteries. Nevertheless, understanding the Li+ conduction mechanism is limited because of the complex amorphous nature of the glass. Herein, we present an ab initio molecular dynamics study of the 70Li2S-30P2S5 glass using a long simulation run (800 ps), improving the general understanding of its structure, dynamics, and electronic polarizability by comparing the results to those of the Li7P3S11 crystals. The shape difference of the P2S74- between the Li7P3S11 crystal and 70Li2S-30P2S5 glass is clearly observed in P-S-P bond angle, indicating that the P2S74- units in the 70Li2S-30P2S5 glass are relatively free from stress for crystallographic ordering. From the Li trajectories for 800 ps, the diffusion within the limited space in the unit cell is derived as the effective porosity. The lower effective porosity in the 70Li2S-30P2S5 glass compared to the Li7P3S11 crystal implies that a part of volume in the 70Li2S-30P2S5 glass cannot contribute to Li+ conduction. This reduction is attributed to the rotational motion of PS43-, which is observed only in the 70Li2S-30P2S5 glass. The sulfur polarizability is thoroughly analyzed for isotropic and anisotropic span through the Born effective charge tensor. The uniformly anisotropic polarizability of sulfur in the 70Li2S-30P2S5 glass is a characteristic property, which cannot create fast Li+ conduction paths as that in Li7P3S11 crystal.

We report on an ab initio molecular dynamics study of an aqueous NaCl solution under the effect of static electric fields. We found that at low-to-moderate field intensity regimes chlorine ions have a greater mobility than sodium ions which, being a sort of "structure makers", are able to drag their own coordination shells. However, for field strengths exceeding 0.15 V Å(-1) the mobility of sodium ions overcomes that of chlorine ions as both types of ions do actually escape from their respective hydration cages. The presence of charged particles lowers the water dissociation threshold (i.e., the minimum field strength which induces a transfer of protons) from 0.35 V Å(-1) to 0.25 V Å(-1); moreover, a protonic current was also recorded at the estimated dissociation threshold of the solution. The behaviour of the current-voltage diagram of the protonic response to the external electric field is Ohmic as in pure water, with a resulting protonic conductivity of about 2.5 S cm(-1). This value is approximately one third of that estimated in pure water (7.8 S cm(-1)), which shows that the partial breaking of hydrogen bonds induced by the solvated ions hinders the migration of protonic defects. Finally, the conductivity of Na(+) and Cl(-) ions (0.2 S cm(-1)) is in fair agreement with the available experimental data for a solution molarity of 1.7 M.

We used ab initio molecular dynamics (AIMD) to investigate the effect of a monochromatic oscillating electric field in resonance with a particular molecular vibration on surfaces. As a case study, AIMD simulations were carried out for hydroxyl functional groups on graphene. When the frequency of the applied field matches with the C-OH vibration frequency, the amplitude is monotonically amplified, leading to a complete desorption from the surface, overcoming the substantial barrier. This suggests the possibility of activating a particular bond without damaging the remaining surface. We extended this work to the case of the amination of sp(2)-bonded carbon surfaces and discussed the general perspective that, in general, an unfavorable chemical process can be activated by applying an external electric field with an appropriate resonance frequency.