Energy landscape of a Lennard-Jones liquid: Statistics of the stationary points
Abstract
We study the structure of the stationary points of the potential energy of a Lennard-Jones liquid by means of molecular dynamics simulations. We find a well defined potential energy where the degree of instability of the typical stationary points vanishes. This threshold potential energy lies above the lowest glassy minima of the system and marks the border between the saddle-dominated and the minima-dominated regions of the energy landscape. The energies of the inherent structures, as obtained by the Stillinger-Weber method, approach the threshold energy at a temperature close to the mode-coupling transition temperature. Hence the threshold energy marks the potential energy level where the system falls out of equilibrium. The energy landscape at threshold is shown to have many flat directions.Keywords
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