Dear all,
Our group is using Amber since long ago. Nowadays we are sistematically 
using Amber v.7, and one of my Ph.D student face with one problem with 
RESP that I want to expose.
We are using RESP to get a set of atomic charges that are 'independent 
from the conformation' of the substrate. We usually compute several 
conformations with an ab initio program (usually Gaussian), get the 
structure and energies, and we use the structure, the energy and the 
atomic charges into RESP, with the multiconformer option, to get an 
unique set of atomic charges.
When working with fluorine compunds, we realized that averaging two 
conformers, the fluorine atoms got a charge almost zero. We checked the 
behaviour of the RESP program with individual conformations and is 
working properly, but as soon as we are using more than one conformer, 
the charges are greatly reduced and several values are finally near zero.
We were really surprised and we started to search through the RESP code. 
We found thet RESP do not average charges but average the molecular 
electrostatic potentials. This means that the average of the meps of two 
conformers that are enantiomeric is almost null, and atomic charges are 
then also almost zero.
Finally we end up with two possibilities:
1.- we are using RESP in a wrong way
2.- something in RESP is not properly working
Has anyone faced with this problem before?
Can someone give us some information about this point?
Thanks in advance.
-- 
Carlos JAIME
Dept. Quimica, Fac. Ciencias (Cn)
Univ.Autonoma Barcelona
08193 Bellaterra (Barcelona), SPAIN
Phone: ++34-935812591
Fax: ++34-935811265 or ++34-935812477
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Received on Mon Dec 05 2005 - 17:53:00 PST