Dissipative particle dynamics with energy conservation

Departamento de Física Fundamental, UNED, Apartado 60141, 28080 Madrid, Spain

Corresponding author: pep@fisfun.uned.es

Received: 25 June 1997
Accepted: 24 October 1997

Abstract

Dissipative particle dynamics (DPD) does not conserve energy and this precludes its use in the study of thermal processes in complex fluids. We present here a generalization of DPD that incorporates an internal energy and a temperature variable for each particle. The dissipation induced by the dissipative forces between particles is invested in raising the internal energy of the particles. Thermal conduction occurs by means of (inverse) temperature differences. The model can be viewed as a simplified solver of the fluctuating hydrodynamic equations and opens up the possibility of studying thermal processes in complex fluids with a mesoscopic simulation technique.