Collaborative Computational Project Q

Collaborative Computational Project Q (CCPQ) was developed in order to provide software which uses theoretical techniques to catalogue collisions between electrons, positrons or photons and atomic/molecular targets. The 'Q' stands for quantum dynamics. 'Over the years these objectives have expanded to include atoms and molecules in strong (long-pulse and attosecond) laser fields, low-energy interactions of antihydrogen with small atoms and molecules, cold atoms, Bose-Einstein condensates and optical lattices' CCPQ gives essential information on the reactivity of various molecules, and contains two community codes R-matrix suite and MCTDH wavepacket dynamics.

This project is a collaboration between University College London (UCL), University of Bath, and Queen's University Belfast. The project is led by Professor Graham Worth who is the Chair, alongside Vice-Chairs Dr Stephen Clark and Professor Hugo van der Hart. Quantemol Ltd is also a close partner of the project. The project is a result of the previous Collaborative Computation Project 2 (CCP2), and is an improved version of this older project. CCPQ (and its predecessor CCP2) have supported various incarnations of the UK Molecular R-matrix project for almost 40 years.

Applications

Both academic and industrial researchers utilise CCPQ. One of its uses is in the field of plasma research; reliable data on electron and light interactions is essential in order to model plasma processes used both on a small and large scale. Large scale industrial processes need to investigate the implementation of new methods thoroughly, and CCPQ can be used to theoretically determine the value of new processes.

CCPQ has been used to study the Hubbard models for cold atoms in optical lattices, as it provides codes used in this area of research . CCPQ hosted the necessary code on the CCPForge website, which contains other computational research projects.