Intrinsic-Density Functionals

The Hohenberg-Kohn theorem and Kohn-Sham procedure are extended to functionals of the localized intrinsic density of a self-bound system such as a nucleus. After defining the intrinsic-density functional, we modify the usual Kohn-Sham procedure slightly to evaluate the mean-field approximation to the functional, and carefully describe the construction of the leading corrections for a system of fermions in one dimension with a spin-degeneracy equal to the number of particles N. Despite the fact that the corrections are complicated and nonlocal, we are able to construct a local Skyrme-like intrinsic-density functional that, while different from the exact functional, shares with it a minimum value equal to the exact ground-state energy at the exact ground-state intrinsic density, to next-to-leading order in 1/N. We briefly discuss implications for real Skyrme functionals.Comment: 15 page

Reference-State One-Particle Density-Matrix Theory

A density-matrix formalism is developed based on the one-particle density-matrix of a single-determinantal reference-state. The v-representable problem does not appear in the proposed method, nor the need to introduce functionals defined by a constrained search. The correlation-energy functionals are not universal; they depend on the external potential. Nevertheless, model systems can still be used to derive universal energy-functionals. In addition, the correlation-energy functionals can be partitioned into individual terms that are -- to a varying degree -- universal; yielding, for example, an electron gas approximation. Variational and non-variational energy functionals are introduced that yield the target-state energy when the reference state -- or its corresponding one-particle density matrix -- is constructed from Brueckner orbitals. Using many-body perturbation theory, diagrammatic expansions are given for the non-variational energy-functionals, where the individual diagrams explicitly depend on the one-particle density-matrix. Non-variational energy-functionals yield generalized Hartree--Fock equations involving a non-local correlation-potential and the Hartree--Fock exchange; these equations are obtained by imposing the Brillouin--Brueckner condition. The same equations -- for the most part -- are obtained from variational energy-functionals using functional minimizations, yielding the (kernel of) correlation potential as the functional derivative of correlation-energy functionals. Approximations for the correlation-energy functions are introduced, including a one-particle-density-matrix variant of the local-density approximation (LDA) and a variant of the Lee--Yang--Parr (LYP) functional.Comment: 68 Page, 0 Figures, RevTeX 4, Submitted to Phys.Rev.A (on April 28 2003

Potential functionals versus density functionals

Potential functional approximations are an intriguing alternative to density functional approximations. The potential functional that is dual to the Lieb density functional is defined and properties given. The relationship between Thomas-Fermi theory as a density functional and as a potential functional is derived. The properties of several recent semiclassical potential functionals are explored, especially in their approach to the large particle number and classical continuum limits. The lack of ambiguity in the energy density of potential functional approximations is demonstrated. The density-density response function of the semiclassical approximation is calculated and shown to violate a key symmetry condition

Non-universality of commonly used correlation-energy density functionals

The correlation energies of the helium isoelectronic sequence and of Hooke's atom isoelectronic sequence have been evaluated using an assortment of local, gradient and meta-gradient density functionals. The results are compared with the exact correlation energies, showing that while several of the more recent density functionals reproduce the exact correlation energies of the helium isoelectronic sequence rather closely, none is satisfactory for Hooke's atom isoelectronic sequence. It is argued that the uniformly acceptable results for the helium sequence can be explained through simple scaling arguments that do not hold for Hooke's atom sequence, so that the latter system provides a more sensitive testing ground for approximate density functionals. This state of affairs calls for further effort towards formulating correlation-energy density functionals that would be truly universal at least for spherically-symmetric two-fermion systems.Comment: To appear in J. Chem. Phy