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January 22, 2026Advanced Functional Materials0 citations

CMD‐FEP: Machine‐Learned Free‐Energy Prediction for Efficient Screening of Material Interfacial Binder

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MMMengxia MoHYHaiyang YuXZXing Zhou

Key Points

  • This research aims to develop a machine learning framework to accurately predict free energies for interfacial binders in energetic materials.
  • Developed conventional molecular dynamics-free energy perturbation framework (cMD-FEP).
  • Employed machine learning for high-throughput screening of interfacial binders.
  • Utilized staged fine-tuning on molecular dynamics trajectories and free energy data.
  • Analyzed ∼6.3 x 10^4 simulation-derived entries for predictive accuracy.
  • Achieved FEP-level accuracy while screening ∼10^6 octogen-binder pairs in 10 minutes.
  • Predicted reliable free energies for approximately 30,000 candidates.
  • Identified noncanonical chemotypes with superior adhesion strength through clustering.
  • Experimental validation showed strong agreement with predicted free energy trends.

Abstract

ABSTRACT Identifying interfacial binders for energetic materials remains constrained by the inherent trade‐off between computational speed and predictive fidelity. Experimental screening is labor‐intensive, while empirical force‐field molecular dynamics (MD) offers efficiency at the cost of accuracy. Conversely, high‐fidelity approaches such as free‐energy perturbation (FEP) are computationally prohibitive for large chemical spaces. Here, we develop conventional molecular dynamics‐free energy perturbation(cMD‐FEP), an automated Uni‐Mol‐based machine learning framework that seamlessly bridges conventional MD and FEP to enable high‐fidelity, high‐throughput screening of interfacial binders. cMD‐FEP employs staged, independent task‐specific fine‐tuning—first on large‐scale MD trajectories and subsequently on FEP data—yielding an end‐to‐end predictive pipeline that directly maps molecular structures to interfacial interaction and free energies. Trained on datasets of ∼6.3 × 10 4 simulation‐derived entries, cMD‐FEP achieves FEP‐level accuracy with orders‐of‐magnitude acceleration, screening ∼10 6 octogen (HMX)–binder pairs within 10 min and predicting reliable free energies for ∼3 × 10 4 candidates. Clustering of top‐ranking binders identifies several noncanonical chemotypes with superior adhesion strength. Experimental validation on nitrogen‐containing binders confirms the predicted free‐energy trends, demonstrating strong agreement with cMD‐FEP results. This framework exhibits remarkable generalizability and robustness, offering a potential route for data‐driven discovery of organic interfacial functional materials beyond energetic systems.

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Cite This Study

Mo et al. (2026) studied this question.

synapsesocial.com/papers/6971bd90642b1836717e22e2https://doi.org/10.1002/adfm.202529571
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