Forces¶
The Force abstract class¶
The Force objects added to a System define the behavior of the
particles. Force is an abstract class; subclasses implement specific behaviors. Classes that extend Force may implement actual physical forces, or any number of processes that either actually apply forces to particles or directly modify their positions or momenta.
Common bonded and non-bonded forces¶
These classes implement forces that are widely used in biomolecular simulation.
AMOEBA forces¶
These forces are used to implement the polarizable AMOEBA force fields.
Pseudo-forces¶
These inherit from Force, but do not describe physical forces. They are used
to implement thermostats or barostats, or otherwise modify the simulation from
step to step. They are conceptually closer to modifications to the integrator,
but providing them as a Force simplifies implementation and allows them to
be combined in arbitrary ways.
Customizing Force¶
OpenMM provides a number of classes that make it easier to implement custom
forces for common scenarios. These classes implement constructors that take an
algebraic expression as a string. The class is instantiated (not extended) to
provide a Force object that efficiently implements the provided
expression.
