Redox potentials and acidity constants from density functional theory based molecular dynamics.

CONSPECTUS: All-atom methods treat solute and solvent at the same level of electronic structure theory and statistical mechanics. All-atom computation of acidity constants (pKa) and redox potentials is still a challenge. In this Account, we review such a method combining density functional theory based molecular dynamics (DFTMD) and free energy perturbation (FEP) methods. The key computational tool is a FEP based method for reversible insertion of a proton or electron in a periodic DFTMD model system. The free energy of insertion (work function) is computed by thermodynamic integration of vertical energy gaps obtained from total energy differences. The problem of the loss of a physical refe…