A Mock Gas Molecules Model for Accurately Simulating Pressure Load at Micro- and Nanoscales

Abstract

At micro- and nanoscales, the gas pressure load is generally simulated by the thermal motion of gas molecules. However, the pressure load can hardly be produced or controlled accurately, because the effects of the wall thickness and the atomic weight of the gas molecules are not taken into account. In this paper, we propose a universal gas molecules model for simulating the pressure load accurately at micro- and nanoscales, named mock gas molecules model. Six scale-independent parameters are established in this model, thus the model is applicable at both micro- and nanoscales. To present the validity and accuracy of the model, the proposed model is applied into the coarse-grained molecular dynamics simulation of graphene blister, and the simulation results agree well with experimental observations from the graphene blister test, indicating that the model can produce and control the pressure load accurately. Furthermore, the model can be easily implemented into many simulators for problems about the solid–gas interaction, especially for membrane gas systems.