VMD - Visual Molecular Dynamics

VMD is a molecular visualization program for displaying, animating, and analyzing large biomolecular systems using 3-D graphics and built-in scripting. VMD supports computers running MacOS-X, Unix, or Windows, is distributed free of charge, and includes source code.

The standard distribution is compiled with Tcl, which add a complete scripting language including variables, loops, and conditionals along with a standard method for communicating with other programs via standard TCP/IP sockets. Versions 1.2 and later also include the Tk toolkit, for creating menus with buttons bound to ones favorite actions. The Tcl text interface provides complete access to all the VMD commands.

Since its inception, VMD was designed to take advantage of graphics processing units (GPUs) for interactive renderings of large biomolecular complexes.

VMD takes advantage of inexpensive game technologies, graphics boards and stereo glasses to provide capabilities for PC users which were once only available in $40,000 workstations.

Publications

Petascale Tcl with NAMD, VMD, and Swift/T , 2014-11, by James C. Phillips, John E. Stone, Kirby L. Vandivort, Timothy G. Armstrong, Justin M. Wozniak, Michael Wilde, Klaus Schulten

Presented at the First Workshop for High Performance Technical Computing in Dynamic Languages