Advantages of the Rayleigh-Lowe-Andersen thermostat in soft sphere molecular dynamics simulations

The Rayleigh-Lowe-Andersen thermostat is a momentum-conserving, Galilean-invariant analogue of the Andersen thermostat, like the original (Maxwellian) Lowe-Andersen thermostat. However, the Rayleigh-Lowe-Andersen thermostat remains local even if the fluid density becomes low. By using a minimized thermostat interaction radius we show with a molecular dynamics simulation that the Rayleigh-Lowe-Andersen thermostat affects the natural dynamics of a low-density Lennard-Jones fluid in a minimal fashion. We also show that it is no longer necessary to consider a separate simulation just to determine the optimal value of the thermostat interaction radius. Instead, this value is computed directly during the main simulation run. Because the Rayleigh-Lowe-Andersen thermostat can be combined with the velocity Verlet integration scheme, we expect a widespread applicability of the thermal mechanism presented here.