# Want to get MM energies (electrostatic and van der Waals) without any cut-offs

**URL:** <https://gromacs.bioexcel.eu/t/want-to-get-mm-energies-electrostatic-and-van-der-waals-without-any-cut-offs/9854>\
**Category:** User discussions\
**Tags:** mdp-parameters, mdrun\
**Created:** [August 9, 2024, 5:23pm UTC](https://gromacs.bioexcel.eu/t/want-to-get-mm-energies-electrostatic-and-van-der-waals-without-any-cut-offs/9854 "2024-08-09T17:23:52Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 2\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![aapo2002](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/a87d85/32.png) [@aapo2002](https://gromacs.bioexcel.eu/u/aapo2002)\
**Post date:** [August 9, 2024, 5:23pm UTC](https://gromacs.bioexcel.eu/t/want-to-get-mm-energies-electrostatic-and-van-der-waals-without-any-cut-offs/9854/1 "2024-08-09T17:23:52Z")

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GROMACS version:2024  
GROMACS modification: No

I have a small system in which there is a ligand with several waters. I would like to simulate this and print the coulombic and LJ energies without any cutoffs. I have very small system so I do not care about the computational performance but I care about the inclusion of all solvents’ interaction with ligand. Current Gromacs version keeps asking the cut-off scheme for vdw and coul, which i really do not want. How can I achieve that? One way to increase box size but in NVT-MD solvents gets too far from ligand. In NPT-MD, the box size shrinks over time and at some point reaches to the limit of the cutoffs (twice as much). All I want is a simple MM energy term without exclusion of any solvents by cut-offs on vdw or coul.  
So far what I had to do is the following:

1. I bring the system at the equilibrium at NPT after NVT. That way, I could learn how much the box size would be according to the number of solvents I have in the system (which is less than 100).
2. I use gmx editconf to change the box size of the NPT to trick the program for accounting all interactions
3. I rerun mdrun -rerun of the NPT trajectory.

Is this an accurate way? or could someone tell me how to achieve this step by step?

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![aapo2002](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/a87d85/32.png) [@aapo2002](https://gromacs.bioexcel.eu/u/aapo2002)\
**Post date:** [August 12, 2024, 4:43pm UTC](https://gromacs.bioexcel.eu/t/want-to-get-mm-energies-electrostatic-and-van-der-waals-without-any-cut-offs/9854/2 "2024-08-12T16:43:52Z")

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I have found the solution using Gromacs \<=2020:

1. Run the simulation regularly using either group or verlet scheme. (EM, NVT and NPT)
2. Convert the trajectory of interest by:  
“gmx trjconv -f nptsd.xtc -s nptsd.tpr -pbc mol -center -o trjmol.xtc”
3. Generate another tpr by a special mdp in which pbc=no, nstlist=rlist=rcoulomb==rvdw=0 and cutoff-scheme=group  
“gmx grompp -f test.mdp -p topol.top -c npt.gro -o test.tpr”
4. Re-run the trajectory by:  
“gmx mdrun -rerun trjmol.xtc -deffnm test”

Now the new edr file has the correct coulomb and vdw, agreeing with gmx\_MMPBSA or g\_MMPBSA predicted coul and vdw terms.