Does the Sastry transition control cavitation in simple liquids?

We examine the Sastry (athermal cavitation) transitions for model monatomic liquids interacting via Lennard-Jones as well as shorter- and longer-ranged pair potentials. Low-temperature thermodynamically stable liquids have ρ < ρ_S except when the attractive forces are long-ranged. For moderate- and short-ranged attractions, stable liquids with ρ > ρ_S exist at higher temperatures; the pressures in these liquids are high, but the Sastry transition may strongly influence their cavitation under dynamic hydrostatic expansion. The temperature T^* at which stable ρ > ρ_S liquids emerge is ∼0.84ϵ/k_B for Lennard-Jones liquids; T^* decreases (increases) rapidly with increasing (decreasing) pair-interaction range. In particular, for short-ranged potentials, T^* is above the critical temperature. All liquids' inherent structures are isostructural (isomorphic) for densities below (above) the Sastry density ρ_S. Overall, our results suggest that the barriers to cavitation in most simple liquids under ambient conditions for which significant cavitation is likely to occur are primarily vibrational-energetic and entropic rather than configurational-energetic. The most likely exceptions to this rule are liquids with long-ranged pair interactions, such as alkali metals.