Search research articles

ABOUT JoVE

Overview Leadership Blog JoVE Help Center

AUTHORS

Publishing Process Editorial Board Scope & Policies Peer Review FAQ Submit

LIBRARIANS

Testimonials Subscriptions Access Resources Library Advisory Board FAQ

RESEARCH

JoVE Journal Methods Collections JoVE Encyclopedia of Experiments Archive

EDUCATION

JoVE Core JoVE Business JoVE Science Education JoVE Lab Manual Faculty Resource Center Faculty Site

Terms & Conditions of Use

Related Concept Videos

Van der Waals Interactions

Van der Waals Interactions

Atoms and molecules interact with each other through intermolecular forces. These electrostatic forces arise from attractive or repulsive interactions between particles with permanent, partial, or temporary charges. The intermolecular forces between neutral atoms and molecules are ion–dipole, dipole–dipole, and dispersion forces, collectively known as van der Waals forces.

Intermolecular Forces

Intermolecular Forces

Atoms and molecules interact through bonds (or forces): intramolecular and intermolecular. The forces are electrostatic as they arise from interactions (attractive or repulsive) between charged species (permanent, partial, or temporary charges) and exist with varying strengths between ions, polar, nonpolar, and neutral molecules. The different types of intermolecular forces are ion–dipole, dipole–dipole, hydrogen bonds, and dispersion; among these, dipole–dipole, hydrogen...

Intermolecular Forces and Physical Properties

Intermolecular Forces and Physical Properties

The Equilibrium Binding Constant and Binding Strength

The Equilibrium Binding Constant and Binding Strength

The equilibrium binding constant (Kb) quantifies the strength of a protein-ligand interaction. Kb can be calculated as follows when the reaction is at equilibrium:

The Equilibrium Binding Constant and Binding Strength

The Equilibrium Binding Constant and Binding Strength

Noncovalent Attractions in Biomolecules

Noncovalent Attractions in Biomolecules

Noncovalent attractions are associations within and between molecules that influence the shape and structural stability of complexes. These interactions differ from covalent bonding in that they do not involve sharing of electrons.
Four types of noncovalent interactions are hydrogen bonds, van der Waals forces, ionic bonds, and hydrophobic interactions.
Hydrogen bonding results from the electrostatic attraction of a hydrogen atom covalently bonded to a strong-electronegative atom like oxygen,...

You might also read

Related Articles

Articles linked to this work by shared authors, journal, and citation graph.

Sort by

Same author

Looking for a double-hybrid recipe to accurately predict spin-state energy gaps of transition metal complexes.

The Journal of chemical physics·2026

Same author

Gaussian Charge-Based Electrostatic Embedding Scheme for Solid-State Excited-State Modeling.

Journal of chemical theory and computation·2026

Same author

Structure-Dependent Antioxidant Activity of Ibogalogs: Impact of Methoxy Group Position on the Protective Activity in Model and Synaptosomal Lipid Membranes.

ACS chemical neuroscience·2026

Same author

Optical Properties of Chiral Perovskites: The Role of Electrostatic Embedding in Correcting the Accuracy of Exchange-Correlation Functionals.

The journal of physical chemistry letters·2026

Same author

Blue Shift in Electrochromic Dye Emission Indicates Distinct Electrostatic Environment at Air-Water Interfaces.

Journal of the American Chemical Society·2026

Same author

Contemporary DFT: learning from traditional and recent trends for the development and assessment of accurate exchange-correlation functionals.

Physical chemistry chemical physics : PCCP·2026

Search research articles

Related Experiment Video

Updated: Jan 13, 2026

15N CPMG Relaxation Dispersion for the Investigation of Protein Conformational Dynamics on the µs-ms Timescale

15N CPMG Relaxation Dispersion for the Investigation of Protein Conformational Dynamics on the µs-ms Timescale

Published on: April 19, 2021

Weak Noncovalent Interactions in Nonequilibrium Structures: How Good Are the Dispersion Corrections?

Lorenzo Briccolani-Bandini¹, Bhavesh Gnnanapareddy², Frédéric Labat³

¹Dipartimento di Chimica "Ugo Schiff", Università degli Studi di Firenze, Via della Lastruccia 3, 50019 Sesto Fiorentino, Italy.

The Journal of Physical Chemistry Letters

|January 9, 2026

Summary

Density functional theory struggles with noncovalent interactions in nonequilibrium structures. Dispersion corrections like VV10 and MBD show promise for accurately modeling these challenging systems.

More Related Videos

Excitonic Hamiltonians for Calculating Optical Absorption Spectra and Optoelectronic Properties of Molecular Aggregates and Solids

Excitonic Hamiltonians for Calculating Optical Absorption Spectra and Optoelectronic Properties of Molecular Aggregates and Solids

Published on: May 27, 2020

Thermochemical Studies of NiII and ZnII Ternary Complexes Using Ion Mobility-Mass Spectrometry

Thermochemical Studies of NiII and ZnII Ternary Complexes Using Ion Mobility-Mass Spectrometry

Published on: June 8, 2022

Related Experiment Videos

Last Updated: Jan 13, 2026

15N CPMG Relaxation Dispersion for the Investigation of Protein Conformational Dynamics on the µs-ms Timescale

15N CPMG Relaxation Dispersion for the Investigation of Protein Conformational Dynamics on the µs-ms Timescale

Published on: April 19, 2021

Excitonic Hamiltonians for Calculating Optical Absorption Spectra and Optoelectronic Properties of Molecular Aggregates and Solids

Excitonic Hamiltonians for Calculating Optical Absorption Spectra and Optoelectronic Properties of Molecular Aggregates and Solids

Published on: May 27, 2020

Thermochemical Studies of NiII and ZnII Ternary Complexes Using Ion Mobility-Mass Spectrometry

Thermochemical Studies of NiII and ZnII Ternary Complexes Using Ion Mobility-Mass Spectrometry

Published on: June 8, 2022

Area of Science:

Computational chemistry
Materials science

Background:

Density functional theory (DFT) methods often struggle to accurately describe noncovalent interactions.
Dispersion corrections are crucial for improving DFT accuracy, especially for van der Waals forces.

Purpose of the Study:

To evaluate the performance of various dispersion corrections in density functional theory for describing noncovalent interactions in nonequilibrium structures.
To identify which dispersion corrections are most reliable for challenging molecular geometries.

Main Methods:

Testing common dispersion corrections (D-family, XDM, VV10, MBD) on acene and polyene dimers in eclipsed arrangements.
Analyzing the accuracy of these corrections for systems far from their energy minima.

Main Results:

Dispersion corrections relying on electron density information (VV10, MBD) performed well for nonequilibrium structures.
Other dispersion correction methods showed increasing errors with system size.
Nonequilibrium geometries are inadequately represented in the parameterization of many dispersion corrections.

Conclusions:

VV10 and MBD corrections show potential for accurately modeling noncovalent interactions in challenging, nonequilibrium geometries.
Current dispersion correction parameterizations may limit the accurate modeling of real-world systems and conditions.
Further development is needed to improve the representation of nonequilibrium structures in dispersion corrections.