Reply to "Comment on 'Efficient stress relaxation in molecular dynamics simulations of semiflexible n-alkanes' " - art. no. 028702

The main issue of our original paper [Phys. Rev. E 58, 6766 (1998)] is to d emonstrate that the so-called atomic scaling, in which all available degree s of freedom are coupled to the pressure bath, is more efficient for stress relaxation in large molecules than the conventional molecular scaling in w hich the molecular centers of mass are coupled to the pressure bath, and in ternal degrees of freedom are left unchanged. Marchi and Procacci (MP) clai m that this is not the case and try to demonstrate this by a simulation of the alkane system II (dotriacontanes, 32 monomers) treated in our paper, co mparing atomic and molecular scaling with their R-RESPA integrator. They st ate that the stress-relaxation process should happen within a few picosecon ds. As a possible explanation for their findings, they state an incorrect c omputation of the molecular pressure in our paper. Furthermore, MP claim th ere are further inconsistencies in our paper. In this Reply, it will be sho wn that contrary to the statements of MP, the virial has been computed corr ectly. Moreover, the inconsistency statement by MP results from the fact th at MP have confused features in the figures of our paper. Finally, we do no t agree that the stress relaxation of dotriacontanes seen in bur simulation s on the time scale of hundreds of picoseconds should happen within a few p icoseconds. At room temperature, these systems form waxes and a slowing dow n of stress relaxation with respect to the liquid phase is to be expected. [S1063-651X(00)11412-6].