AtomEye: an efficient atomistic configuration viewer

Abstract

AtomEye is free atomistic visualization software for all major UNIX platforms. It is based on a newly developed graphics core library of higher quality than the X-window standard, with area-weighted anti-aliasing. An order-N neighbourlist algorithm is used to compute the bond connectivity. The functionalities of AtomEye include: parallel and perspective projections with full three-dimensional navigation; customizable bond and coordination number calculation; colour-encoding of arbitrary user-defined quantities; local atomic strain invariant; coloured atom tiling and tracing; up to 16 cutting planes; periodic boundary condition translations; high-quality JPEG, PNG and EPS screenshots; and animation scripting. The program is efficient compared to OpenGL hardware acceleration by employing special algorithms to treat spheres (atoms) and cylinders (bonds), in which they are rendered as primitive objects rather than as composites of polygons. AtomEye can handle more than one million atoms on a PC with 1 GB memory. It is a robust, low-cost tool for surveying nanostructures and following their evolutions.