Solvation entropy, enthalpy and free energy prediction using a multi-task deep learning functional in 1D-RISM

Simultaneous calculation of entropies, enthalpies and free energies has been a long-standing challenge in computational chemistry, partly because of the difficulty in obtaining estimates of all three properties from a single consistent simulation methodology. This has been particularly true for methods from the Integral Equation Theory of Molecular Liquids such as the Reference Interaction Site Model which have traditionally given large errors in solvation thermodynamics. Recently, we presented pyRISM-CNN, a combination of the 1 Dimensional Reference Interaction Site Model (1D-RISM) solver, pyRISM, with a deep learning based free energy functional, as a method of predicting solvation free energy (SFE). With this approach, a 40-fold improvement in prediction accuracy was delivered for a multi-solvent, multi-temperature dataset when compared to the standard 1D-RISM theory [Fowles et al., Digital Discovery, 2023, 2, 177-188]. Here, we report three further developments to the pyRISM-CNN methodology. Firstly, solvation free energies have been introduced for organic molecular ions in methanol or water solvent systems at 298 K, with errors below 4 kcal mol(-1) obtained without the need for corrections or additional descriptors. Secondly, the number of solvents in the training data has been expanded from carbon tetrachloride, water and chloroform to now also include methanol. For neutral solutes, prediction errors nearing or below 1 kcal mol(-1) are obtained for each organic solvent system at 298 K and water solvent systems at 273-373 K. Lastly, pyRISM-CNN was successfully applied to the simultaneous prediction of solvation enthalpy, entropy and free energy through a multi-task learning approach, with errors of 1.04, 0.98 and 0.47 kcal mol(-1), respectively, for water solvent systems at 298 K.

Automated summary

Simultaneous calculation of entropies, enthalpies, and free energies has long been a challenge in computational chemistry. Recently, a new method called pyRISM-CNN was proposed, which combines the 1D-RISM solver with a deep learning-based free energy functional to predict solvation free energy. This method shows significant improvement in prediction accuracy compared to the standard 1D-RISM theory.