NAMD, recipient of a 2002 Gordon Bell Award, a 2012 Sidney Fernbach Award, and a 2020 Gordon Bell Prize, is a parallel molecular dynamics code designed for high-performance simulation of large biomolecular systems. Based on Charm++ parallel objects, NAMD scales to hundreds of cores for typical simulations and beyond 500,000 cores for the largest simulations. NAMD uses the popular molecular graphics program VMD for simulation setup and trajectory analysis, but is also file-compatible with AMBER, CHARMM, and X-PLOR. NAMD is distributed free of charge with source code. You can build NAMD yourself or download binaries for a wide variety of platforms. Our tutorials show you how to use NAMD and VMD for biomolecular modeling.

Search all NAMD resources:

Breaking News

NAMD 3.0.1 Release - Point release bug fixes for stable release 3.0 featuring new GPU-resident mode for NVIDIA and compatible AMD GPUs. Updates to Colvars, Charm++, and user guide documentation. We strongly encourage users of version 3.0 to upgrade immediately to version 3.0.1.

NAMD 3.0 New Features - webpage is posted

NAMD GPU-resident benchmarks - results and data sets with GPU-optimized configuration posted

NAMD 2.15 ALPHA Release providing GPU-offload support for Intel GPU Max Series. This source code release available on the download page includes SYCL code that can be built using the Intel oneAPI toolkits. Following the download link reveals a page with detailed build instructions.

Other Spotlights 

Spotlight: Gene Lock (May 2005)

The <i>lac</i> repressor and its DNA loop

image size: 80.0KB
made with VMD

When Escherichia coli bacteria enjoy lactose and related food molecules in their environment, the cells quickly furnish proteins needed for import and metabolic digestion of the food. A set of genes, called the lac operon, is transcribed into messenger RNA that directs the synthesis of these proteins. When lactose is not available, the protein synthesis would be wasteful and, indeed, is prevented by locking the lac operon. This is achieved by a protein called lac repressor that forces the segment of the lac operon needed to initiate transcription into a loop, but that can be unlocked by a lactose molecule binding to the protein as soon as the food becomes available again. A recent study of the lac repressor combines a 314,000-atom protein simulation using NAMD with a multiscale simulation technique coupling the protein to the DNA loop. The calculations reveal how the lac repressor stretches out two "hands" grabbing the genomic DNA and then keeps a tight grip on the DNA wrestling it into a loop. The discovery is described on our website as well as in a popular article.

Overview

Why NAMD? (in pictures)
How to Cite NAMD
Features and Capabilities
Performance Benchmarks
Publications and Citations
Credits and Development Team

Availability

Read the License
Download NAMD Binaries (also VMD)
Build from Source Code - Git access now available
Run at NCSA, SDSC, NICS, or Texas

Training

NAMD Developer Workshop in Urbana (August 19-20, 2019)
PRACE School on HPC for Life Sciences (June 10-13, 2019)
"Hands-On" Workshop in Pittsburgh (May 13-17, 2019)
Charm++ Workshop in Urbana (May 1-2, 2019)
Enhanced Sampling and Free-Energy Workshop (Sept 10-14, 2018)
NAMD Developer Workshop in Urbana (June 11-12, 2018)
"Hands-On" Workshop in Pittsburgh (May 21-25, 2018)
"Hands-On" QM/MM Simulation Workshop (April 5-7, 2018)
Older "Hands-On" Workshops

Support

Having Problems with NAMD?

NAMD Wiki (Recent Changes)
  
NAMD-L Mailing List (Archive)
  
Tutorial-L Mailing List (Archive)
  

Mailing List Issues for Yahoo.com Addresses

Announcements

NAMD 3.0.1 Release (Oct 2024)
NAMD 3.0 Release (Jun 2024)
NAMD 3.0 New Features (Feb 2024)
NAMD 2.14 Bug Fixes (Apr 2022)
NAMD 2.14 Release (Aug 2020)
NAMD 2.14 New Features
One-click NAMD/VMD in the cloud
QM/MM Interface to MOPAC and ORCA
QwikMD GUI Released in VMD 1.9.3
Previous Announcements

Documentation

NAMD 3.0.1 User's Guide
  
   (also 4.7M HTML or 4.5M PDF)
NAMD 3.0.1 Release Notes
Running Charm++ Programs (including NAMD)
Running GPU-Accelerated NAMD (from NVIDIA)
Introductory NAMD Tutorials
All NAMD & VMD Tutorials
  

Related Codes, Scripts, and Examples
NAMD Wiki (Recent Changes)
Older Documentation

News

Sparing healthy microbes while using a novel antibiotic
AMBER force field use in NAMD for large scale simulation
NAMD GPU-resident benchmarks available
NAMD and VMD share in COVID-19 Gordon Bell Special Prize
NAMD reference paper published online
Coronavirus Simulations by U. Delaware Team
Coronavirus Simulations on Frontera Supercomputer
Breakthrough Flu Simulations
Oak Ridge Exascale Readiness Program
Prepping for Next-Generation Cray at NERSC
Supercomputing HIV-1 Replication
How GPUs help in the fight against staph infections
Computational Microscope Gets Subatomic Resolution
Opening New Frontiers in the Battle Against HIV/AIDS
HIV Capsid Interacting with Environment
Assembling Life's Molecular Motor
Older News Items