Microscopic stress fields are widely used in molecular simulations to understand mechanical behavior. Recently, decomposition methods of multibody forces to central force pairs between the interacting particles have been proposed. Here, we introduce a force center of a three-body potential and propose different force decompositions that also satisfy the conservation of translational and angular momentum. We compare the force decompositions by stress-distribution magnitude and discuss their difference in the stress profile of a bilayer membrane by using coarse-grained and atomistic molecular dynamics simulations.

• Received 27 July 2016
• Revised 10 October 2016

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevE.94.053304