Towards a microscopic description of the free-energy landscape of water

• Published in: The Journal of chemical physics Vol. 137; no. 14; p. 144504
• Main Authors: Prada-Gracia, Diego, Shevchuk, Roman, Hamm, Peter, Rao, Francesco
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: United States 14.10.2012
• DOI: 10.1063/1.4755746

Free-energy landscape theory is often used to describe complex molecular systems. Here, a microscopic description of water structure and dynamics based on configuration-space-networks and molecular dynamics simulations of the TIP4P/2005 model is applied to investigate the free-energy landscape of water. The latter is built on top of a large set of water microstates describing the kinetic stability of local hydrogen-bond arrangements up to the second solvation shell. In temperature space, the landscape displays three different regimes. At around ambient conditions, the free-energy surface is characterized by many short-lived basins of attraction which are structurally well-defined (inhomogeneous regime). At lower temperatures instead, the liquid rapidly becomes homogeneous. In this regime, the free energy is funneled-like, with fully coordinated water arrangements at the bottom of the funnel. Finally, a third regime develops below the temperature of maximal compressibility (Widom line) where the funnel becomes steeper with few interconversions between microstates other than the fully coordinated ones. Our results present a way to manage the complexity of water structure and dynamics, connecting microscopic properties to its ensemble behavior.