The Influence of a Parameter that Controls the Asymmetry of a Potential Energy Surface with an Entrance Channel and Two Potential Wells

TL;DR

This study investigates how varying a parameter affects the energy surface's asymmetry, potential wells, and trajectory branching ratios in a valley-ridge inflection point (VRI) potential with two saddles.

Contribution

It introduces analysis of an asymmetric VRI potential, examining how parameter changes influence the energy surface, potential wells, and trajectory dynamics.

Findings

Potential depth and flatness vary with asymmetry parameter.

Branching ratios between wells depend on the parameter.

Correlation established between manifold areas and trajectory outcomes.

Abstract

In this paper we study an asymmetric valley-ridge inflection point (VRI) potential, whose energy surface (PES) features two sequential index-1 saddles (the upper and the lower), with one saddle having higher energy than the other and two potential wells separated by the lower index-1 saddle. We show how the depth and the flatness of our potential changes as we modify the parameter that controls the asymmetry as well as how the branching ratio (ratio of the trajectories that enter each well) is changing as we modify the same parameter and its correlation with the area of the lobes as they have formulated by the stable and unstable manifolds that have been extracted from the gradient of the LD scalar fields.