The Stockmayer potential is a mathematical model for representing the interactions between pairs of

atoms Every atom is composed of a nucleus and one or more electrons bound to the nucleus. The nucleus is made of one or more protons and a number of neutrons. Only the most common variety of hydrogen has no neutrons. Every solid, liquid, gas ...

molecules A molecule is a group of two or more atoms held together by attractive forces known as chemical bonds; depending on context, the term may or may not include ions which satisfy this criterion. In quantum physics, organic chemistry, and bioc ...

. It is defined as a

Lennard-Jones potential The Lennard-Jones potential (also termed the LJ potential or 12-6 potential) is an intermolecular pair potential. Out of all the intermolecular potentials, the Lennard-Jones potential is probably the one that has been the most extensively studied ...

with a point

electric dipole moment The electric dipole moment is a measure of the separation of positive and negative electrical charges within a system, that is, a measure of the system's overall polarity. The SI unit for electric dipole moment is the coulomb-meter (C⋅m). The ...

. A Stockmayer liquid consists of a collection of spheres with point dipoles embedded at the centre of each. These spheres interact both by Lennard-Jones and dipolar interactions. In the absence of the point dipoles, the spheres face no rotational friction and the translational dynamics of such LJ spheres have been studied in detail. This system, therefore, provides a simple model where the only source of rotational friction is dipolar interactions

References

M. E. Van Leeuwe "Deviation from corresponding-states behaviour for polar fluids", Molecular Physics 82 pp. 383-392 (1994) Reinhard Hentschke, Jörg Bartke, and Florian Pesth "Equilibrium polymerization and gas-liquid critical behavior in the Stockmayer fluid", Physical Review E 75 011506 (2007)
Quantum mechanical potentials Theoretical chemistry Molecular physics {{AMO-physics-stub