Generalized-ensemble molecular dynamics and Monte Carlo algorithms beyond the limit of the multicanonical algorithm

I review two new generalized-ensemble algorithms for molecular dynamics and Monte Carlo simulations of biomolecules, that is, the multibaric-multithermal algorithm and the partial multicanonical algorithm. In the multibaric- multithermal algorithm, two-dimensional random walks not only in the potential-energy space but also in the volume space are realized. One can discuss the temperature dependence and pressure dependence of biomolecules with this algorithm. The partial multicanonical simulation samples a wide range of only an important part of potential energy, so that one can concentrate the effort to determine a multicanonical weight factor only on the important energy terms. This algorithm has higher sampling efficiency than the multicanonical and canonical algorithms. © 2010 Vietnam Academy of Science & Technology.