Removing external degrees of freedom from transition-state search methods using quaternions

In finite systems, such as nanoparticles and gas-phase molecules, calculations of minimum energy paths (MEPs) connecting initial and final states of transitions as well as searches for saddle points are complicated by the presence of external degrees of freedom, such as overall translation and rotation. A method based on quaternion algebra for removing the external degrees of freedom is described here and applied in calculations using two commonly used methods: the nudged elastic band (NEB) method for MEPs and the DIMER method for finding the minimum mode in minimum mode following searches of first-order saddle points. With the quaternion approach, fewer images in the NEB are needed to represent MEPs accurately. In both NEB and DIMER calculations of finite systems, the number of iterations required to reach convergence is significantly reduced. The algorithms have been implemented in the Atomic Simulation Environment (ASE) open source software.