Global integration of the Schr\"odinger equation: a short iterative scheme within the wave operator formalism using discrete Fourier transforms

A global solution of the Schr\"odinger equation for explicitly time-dependent Hamiltonians is derived by integrating the non-linear differential equation associated with the time-dependent wave operator. A fast iterative solution method is proposed in which, however, numerous integrals over time have to be evaluated. This internal work is done using a numerical integrator based on Fast Fourier Transforms (FFT). The case of a transition between two potential wells of a model molecule driven by intense laser pulses is used as an illustrative example. This application reveals some interesting features of the integration technique. Each iteration provides a global approximate solution on grid points regularly distributed over the full time propagation interval. Inside the convergence radius, the complete integration is competitive with standard algorithms, especially when high accuracy is required.Comment: 25 pages, 14 figure

Calculation of Densities of States and Spectral Functions by Chebyshev Recursion and Maximum Entropy

We present an efficient algorithm for calculating spectral properties of large sparse Hamiltonian matrices such as densities of states and spectral functions. The combination of Chebyshev recursion and maximum entropy achieves high energy resolution without significant roundoff error, machine precision or numerical instability limitations. If controlled statistical or systematic errors are acceptable, cpu and memory requirements scale linearly in the number of states. The inference of spectral properties from moments is much better conditioned for Chebyshev moments than for power moments. We adapt concepts from the kernel polynomial approximation, a linear Chebyshev approximation with optimized Gibbs damping, to control the accuracy of Fourier integrals of positive non-analytic functions. We compare the performance of kernel polynomial and maximum entropy algorithms for an electronic structure example.Comment: 8 pages RevTex, 3 postscript figure