Question

Lennard-Jones potential*

A commonly used potential energy function to describe the in teraction between two atoms is the Lennard-Jones 6-12 potential given by

U = e(²9) ¹² - ² (²) ².
(a) Find the position of the potential minimum and its value.

(b) Near the minimum the atoms execute simple harmonic motion. Find the frequency of oscillation.​

Answer 1

Answer:

The Lennard-Jones model consists of two 'parts'; a steep repulsive term, and smoother attractive term, representing the London dispersion forces. Apart from being an important model in itself, the Lennard-Jones potential frequently forms one of 'building blocks' of many force fields. It is worth mentioning that the 12-6 Lennard-Jones model is not the most faithful representation of the potential energy surface, but rather its use is widespread due to its computational expediency.The Lennard-Jones Potential is given by the following equation: