A conformational analysis method for understanding the energy landscapes of clusters

A newly developed unbiased structural optimization method, named dynamic lattice searching (DLS), is proposed as an approach for conformational analysis of atomic/molecular clusters and used in understanding the energy landscape of large clusters. The structures of clusters ore described in terms of the number of basic tetrahedron (BT) units they contain. We found that the hit numbers of different structural motifs in DLS runs is proportional to the number of BTs. A parameter T-max is defined to limit the maximal number of atoms moved in a structural transition. Results show that T-max is a key parameter for modulating the efficiency of the DLS method and has a great influence on the hit number of different motifs in DLS runs. Finally, the effect of potential range on the conformational distribution of the (Morse)(98) cluster is also discussed with different potential-range parameters.