OpenMM 8: Molecular Dynamics Simulation with Machine Learning Potentials
This work provides tools for researchers in computational chemistry and biophysics to enhance simulation accuracy using machine learning, though it is incremental as an update to an existing toolkit.
The authors introduced new features in OpenMM 8 to support machine learning potentials in molecular dynamics simulations, enabling arbitrary PyTorch models and pretrained functions for improved accuracy with modest cost increases, as demonstrated on CDK8 and GFP chromophore simulations.
Machine learning plays an important and growing role in molecular simulation. The newest version of the OpenMM molecular dynamics toolkit introduces new features to support the use of machine learning potentials. Arbitrary PyTorch models can be added to a simulation and used to compute forces and energy. A higher-level interface allows users to easily model their molecules of interest with general purpose, pretrained potential functions. A collection of optimized CUDA kernels and custom PyTorch operations greatly improves the speed of simulations. We demonstrate these features on simulations of cyclin-dependent kinase 8 (CDK8) and the green fluorescent protein (GFP) chromophore in water. Taken together, these features make it practical to use machine learning to improve the accuracy of simulations at only a modest increase in cost.