Implementation of Sutton-Chen Potential
for Molecular Dynamics

---

One potential used in the molecular dynamics simulation is that described by Sutton and Chen [Sutton, A. P., and Chen, J., 1990, Philos. Mag. Lett., 61, 139]. It has the form:

Here r _i is a density-like term for atom i:

Here the potential has three dimensionless parameters adjustable for the material. They are c, n, and m, and can be chosen for various materials especially metals. The variable e sets the energy scale, and a is the lattice constant.

The total force is calculated from the potential as:

with some effort this is reduced to

where, f_ki, the magnitude of the force between atoms i and j is

(JPEG images of the two page derivation are available.)

For each atom the local density-like term is computed r _i, then each unique f_ki.

References: