A "soft-core" potential was used to decouple the solute-solvent intermolecular LJ interactions. Stage (m) dependent decoupling parameters, λ LJ m and λ elec m controlled the LJ and electrostatic intermolecular interactions, respectively. The decoupling parameters varied from 0 to 1. When λ LJ m = λ elec m = 1, the solute is fully coupled to the system. When λ LJ m = λ elec m = 0, the solute is decoupled from the system. The "soft-core" potential had the form [74-76]