Dear Amber community,
I am trying to compute the free energy of hydration of a set of small
molecules at different salt concentrations, using TI. I want to use a
2-step transform (i.e., first remove the charges, then the Van der Waals
part).
However, I have problems figuring out how to set up the electrostatic
step in pmemd (CUDA-version, using Amber 20). Currently, my input file
looks like this:
production 10 ns npt run - Berendsen barostat, TI, remove charges
&cntrl
ntx=1, irest=0,
ioutfm=1,
ntb=2, iwrap=1,
ntp=1, barostat=2, pres0=1.0,taup=1.0,
ntc=2, ntf=1,
ntt=3, tempi=300.0, temp0=300.0, gamma_ln=2,
nstlim=5000000, dt=0.002,
ntwr=50000, ntwx=5000,
ntpr=500,
icfe=1, klambda=1, ifsc=0, timask1=':1', timask2=':2', crgmask=':2',
ifmbar=1, mbar_states=11, tishake=0,
mbar_lambda=0.00,0.10,0.20,0.30,0.40,0.50,0.60,0.70,0.80,0.90,1.00,,
clambda=0.50,
/
(Of course, I have equivalent input files for the other lambda values).
Of this run, I am discarding the first 40% (4ns) as equilibration. The
1st and second residue are 2 copies of my molecule (the topology was
created using tleap by "combine { solute solute solvent }".)
The problem is that I am getting very large free energies (e.g, 130
kcal/mol for caffeine, favoring lambda=0). This occurs with and without
the salt, so I think the problem is not related to the ions.
Furthermore, I don't think that convergence is the problem, because I
tried using 10x longer simulations for a few systems, and the results
are very similar.
The VdW contribution is rather close to zero, and therefore doesn't
compensate the high values. I assume that this is realistic, and that
the problem is related to the electrostatics part. (is this correct?)
I would be very thankful for any suggestions on what might be wrong here...
Best regards,
Franz Waibl
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Received on Mon Nov 30 2020 - 07:00:03 PST
