On Tue, Oct 4, 2016 at 8:48 AM, Hirdesh Kumar <hirdesh.iitd.gmail.com>
wrote:
> Hi,
> I am doing a long simulation of my protein-ligand complex. In the out file,
> the time step was written as:
> TIME(PS) = 335980.000 (note XXX.000 format)..
>
>
> NSTEP =139790000 *TIME(PS) = 335980.000* TEMP(K) = 298.18 PRESS
> = 15.6
> Etot = -115980.9003 EKtot = 27977.8633 EPtot =
> -143958.7636
> BOND = 1085.4143 ANGLE = 2911.4185 DIHED =
> 4565.4169
> 1-4 NB = 1346.0456 1-4 EEL = 14330.8565 VDWAALS =
> 16001.0010
> EELEC = -184198.9163 EHBOND = 0.0000 RESTRAINT =
> 0.0000
> EKCMT = 12017.9146 VIRIAL = 11864.6655 VOLUME =
> 455008.3585
> Density =
> 1.0337
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> ------------------
>
> wrapping first mol.: -27.96280 -39.54537 68.49461
>
> NSTEP =139795000 *TIME(PS) = 335990.000* TEMP(K) = 299.93 PRESS =
> -246.6
> Etot = -116468.7242 EKtot = 28142.6172 EPtot =
> -144611.3414
> BOND = 1094.3586 ANGLE = 2907.2089 DIHED =
> 4540.0461
> 1-4 NB = 1310.6156 1-4 EEL = 14286.1251 VDWAALS =
> 16100.2964
> EELEC = -184849.9921 EHBOND = 0.0000 RESTRAINT =
> 0.0000
> EKCMT = 12061.4866 VIRIAL = 14481.3696 VOLUME =
> 454452.8877
> Density =
> 1.0350
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> ------------------
>
> wrapping first mol.: -27.97826 -39.56723 68.53246
> wrapping first mol.: -27.97826 -39.56723 68.53246
>
> NSTEP =139800000 *TIME(PS) = 335999.999 * TEMP(K) = 297.37 PRESS
> = 2.1
> Etot = -116224.6694 EKtot = 27902.1836 EPtot =
> -144126.8530
> BOND = 1077.4677 ANGLE = 2884.7374 DIHED =
> 4519.3357
> 1-4 NB = 1305.2631 1-4 EEL = 14371.2153 VDWAALS =
> 15909.1364
> EELEC = -184194.0086 EHBOND = 0.0000 RESTRAINT =
> 0.0000
> EKCMT = 11897.3296 VIRIAL = 11876.4293 VOLUME =
> 455201.7252
> Density =
> 1.0333
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> ------------------
>
> wrapping first mol.: -27.98357 -39.57475 68.54548
>
>
>
>
> As you can see the output was saved at every 10ps. And after 335990.000
> ps, the expected next line should be:
>
> TIME(PS) = 330000.000 PS. But, it was written as TIME(PS) = 335999.999..
>
> This point onward, the output is always in ***.999 format, which is new to
> me. I checked the trajectories and the system looks fine.
>
> Is it the normal behaviour or there is something wrong ?
>
This is normal. It is basic round-off error. The primary time unit is
picoseconds, but your time-step is on the order of femtoseconds -- 0.001 or
0.002 ps. However, both 0.001 and 0.002 are repeating decimals in binary
(which is how computers store numbers), which means that those two numbers
are *impossible* to represent exactly by a simple floating point variable.
So to the computer, the time step is *very close* to 0.001 or 0.002
(whichever you chose), but not exactly the same. If you add that
difference up 330,000,000 times (or 165,000,000 times for a 2 fs time
step), you get something close to 0.001.
At that point, the difference appears in the representation of the number
in the output file.
HTH,
Jason
P.S., you can demonstrate this with your own program. Here is a C program
that illustrates exactly what's happening:
#include <stdio.h>
int main() {
const double dt = 0.002;
double t = 0;
long long int i;
for (i = 0; i < 165000000; i++) {
t += dt;
}
printf("t = %.4f\n", t);
return 0;
}
When I compile this program ("gcc test.c") and run the resulting a.out file
("./a.out"), I see the following output:
$ gcc test.c
$ ./a.out
t = 329999.9996
--
Jason M. Swails
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Received on Tue Oct 04 2016 - 06:30:02 PDT
