Methods, systems, and computer program products for computational analysis and design of amphiphilic polymers

Abstract

Methods, systems, and computer program products for computational polymer processing including, without limitation, computational amphiphilic polymer design, conformational energy minimization, generation and refinement of torsional parameters for sub-units of potential polymers, generation of modified force field parameters, and prediction of conformational information for potential polymers. A target polymer backbone or portion thereof is identified. Small model compounds that have structural connectivities that are similar to structural connectivities of the target polymer backbone or portion thereof, are identified, whereby the combination of the small model compounds serve as a model of the target polymer or portion thereof. Gradient-corrected density functional theory ('DFT') torsional potentials are calculated for the small model compounds, wherein energies are calculated at unconstrained and constrained geometries of the selected small model compounds. New torsional parameters are then obtained from the DFT torsional potentials. The new torsional parameters are combined with other terms to form a modified (or new) force field for the target polymer backbone or portion thereof. Molecular dynamics and configurational-biased Monte Carlo ('MD/MC') simulations are performed using the modified force field, whereby results of the MD/MC simulations serve as predicted conformation properties of the target polymer backbone. The predicted conformation properties for the multiple target polymer backbones are then used to select one or more of the target polymer backbones as candidate amphiphilic polymer backbones for synthesis.