# Body styles

Classes that define body particles are derived from the Body class. Body
particles can represent complex entities, such as surface meshes of
discrete points, collections of sub-particles, deformable objects, etc.

See the [Howto body](Howto_body) page for an overview of using body
particles and the various body styles LAMMPS supports. New styles can be
created to add new kinds of body particles to LAMMPS.

Body_nparticle.cpp is an example of a body particle that is treated as a
rigid body containing N sub-particles.

Here is a brief description of methods you define in your new derived
class. See body.h for details.

  -------------------- ---------------------------------------------------
  data_body            process a line from the Bodies section of a data
                       file

  noutrow              number of sub-particles output is generated for

  noutcol              number of values per-sub-particle output is
                       generated for

  output               output values for the Mth sub-particle

  pack_comm_body       body attributes to communicate every timestep

  unpack_comm_body     unpacking of those attributes

  pack_border_body     body attributes to communicate when reneighboring
                       is done

  unpack_border_body   unpacking of those attributes
  -------------------- ---------------------------------------------------