Hybrid functional calculations of the Al impurity in silica: Hole localization and electron paramagnetic resonance parameters

We performed first-principle calculations based on the supercell and cluster approaches to investigate the neutral Al impurity in smoky quartz. Electron paramagnetic resonance measurements suggest that the oxygens around the Al center undergo a polaronic distortion which localizes the hole being on one of the four oxygen atoms. We find that the screened exchange hybrid functional successfully describes this localization and improves on standard local density approaches or on hybrid functionals that do not include enough exact exchange such as B3LYP. We find a defect level at about 2.5 eV above the valence band maximum, corresponding to a localized hole in a O 2p orbital. The calculated values of the g tensor and the hyperfine splittings are in excellent agreement with experiment.Comment: 5 pages, 2 figures, 1 tabl

The mystery of relationship of mechanics and field in the many-body quantum world

We have revealed three fatal errors incurred from a blind transferring of quantum field methods into the quantum mechanics. This had tragic consequences because it produced crippled model Hamiltonians, unfortunately considered sufficient for a description of solids including superconductors. From there, of course, Fr\"ohlich derived wrong effective Hamiltonian, from which incorrect BCS theory arose. 1) Mechanical and field patterns cannot be mixed. Instead of field methods applied to the mechanical Born-Oppenheimer approximation we have entirely to avoid it and construct an independent and standalone field pattern. This leads to a new form of the Bohr's complementarity on the level of composite systems. 2) We have correctly to deal with the center of gravity, which is under the field pattern "materialized" in the form of new quasipartiles - rotons and translons. This leads to a new type of relativity of internal and external degrees of freedom and one-particle way of bypassing degeneracies (gap formation). 3) The possible symmetry cannot be apriori loaded but has to be aposteriori obtained as a solution of field equations, formulated in a general form without translational or any other symmetry. This leads to an utterly revised view of symmetry breaking in non-adiabatic systems, namely Jahn-Teller effect and superconductivity. These two phenomena are synonyms and share a unique symmetry breaking.Comment: 24 pages, 9 sections; remake of abstract, introduction and conclusion; more physics, less philosoph

Dual kinetic balance approach to basis set expansions for the Dirac equation

A new approach to finite basis sets for the Dirac equation is developed. It solves the problem of spurious states and, as a result, improves the convergence properties of basis set calculations. The efficiency of the method is demonstrated for finite basis sets constructed from B splines by calculating the one-loop self-energy correction for a hydrogenlike ion.Comment: 14 pages, 1 tabl

Relativistic J-matrix method

The relativistic version of the J-matrix method for a scattering problem on the potential vanishing faster than the Coulomb one is formulated. As in the non-relativistic case it leads to a finite algebraic eigenvalue problem. The derived expression for the tangent of phase shift is simply related to the non-relativistic case formula and gives the latter as a limit case. It is due to the fact that the used basis set satisfies the ``kinetic balance condition''.Comment: 21 pages, RevTeX, accepted for publication in Phys. Rev.

Approximate and exact nodes of fermionic wavefunctions: coordinate transformations and topologies

A study of fermion nodes for spin-polarized states of a few-electron ions and molecules with $s,p,d$ one-particle orbitals is presented. We find exact nodes for some cases of two electron atomic and molecular states and also the first exact node for the three-electron atomic system in $^4S(p^3)$ state using appropriate coordinate maps and wavefunction symmetries. We analyze the cases of nodes for larger number of electrons in the Hartree-Fock approximation and for some cases we find transformations for projecting the high-dimensional node manifolds into 3D space. The node topologies and other properties are studied using these projections. We also propose a general coordinate transformation as an extension of Feynman-Cohen backflow coordinates to both simplify the nodal description and as a new variational freedom for quantum Monte Carlo trial wavefunctions.Comment: 7 pages, 7 figure

Correct quantum chemistry in a minimal basis from effective Hamiltonians

We describe how to create ab-initio effective Hamiltonians that qualitatively describe correct chemistry even when used with a minimal basis. The Hamiltonians are obtained by folding correlation down from a large parent basis into a small, or minimal, target basis, using the machinery of canonical transformations. We demonstrate the quality of these effective Hamiltonians to correctly capture a wide range of excited states in water, nitrogen, and ethylene, and to describe ground and excited state bond-breaking in nitrogen and the chromium dimer, all in small or minimal basis sets

Centre-of-mass separation in quantum mechanics: Implications for the many-body treatment in quantum chemistry and solid state physics

We address the question to what extent the centre-of-mass (COM) separation can change our view of the many-body problem in quantum chemistry and solid state physics. It was shown that the many-body treatment based on the electron-vibrational Hamiltonian is fundamentally inconsistent with the Born-Handy ansatz so that such a treatment can never respect the COM problem. Born-Oppenheimer (B-O) approximation reveals some secret: it is a limit case where the degrees of freedom can be treated in a classical way. Beyond the B-O approximation they are inseparable in principle. The unique covariant description of all equations with respect to individual degrees of freedom leads to new types of interaction: besides the known vibronic (electron-phonon) one the rotonic (electron-roton) and translonic (electron-translon) interactions arise. We have proved that due to the COM problem only the hypervibrations (hyperphonons, i.e. phonons + rotons + translons) have true physical meaning in molecules and crystals; nevertheless, the use of pure vibrations (phonons) is justified only in the adiabatic systems. This fact calls for the total revision of our contemporary knowledge of all non-adiabatic effects, especially the Jahn-Teller effect and superconductivity. The vibronic coupling is responsible only for removing of electron (quasi)degeneracies but for the explanation of symmetry breaking and forming of structure the rotonic and translonic coupling is necessary.Comment: 39 pages, 11 sections, 3 appendice

Review of biorthogonal coupled cluster representations for electronic excitation

Single reference coupled-cluster (CC) methods for electronic excitation are based on a biorthogonal representation (bCC) of the (shifted) Hamiltonian in terms of excited CC states, also referred to as correlated excited (CE) states, and an associated set of states biorthogonal to the CE states, the latter being essentially configuration interaction (CI) configurations. The bCC representation generates a non-hermitian secular matrix, the eigenvalues representing excitation energies, while the corresponding spectral intensities are to be derived from both the left and right eigenvectors. Using the perspective of the bCC representation, a systematic and comprehensive analysis of the excited-state CC methods is given, extending and generalizing previous such studies. Here, the essential topics are the truncation error characteristics and the separability properties, the latter being crucial for designing size-consistent approximation schemes. Based on the general order relations for the bCC secular matrix and the (left and right) eigenvector matrices, formulas for the perturbation-theoretical (PT) order of the truncation errors (TEO) are derived for energies, transition moments, and property matrix elements of arbitrary excitation classes and truncation levels. In the analysis of the separability properties of the transition moments, the decisive role of the so-called dual ground state is revealed. Due to the use of CE states the bCC approach can be compared to so-called intermediate state representation (ISR) methods based exclusively on suitably orthonormalized CE states. As the present analysis shows, the bCC approach has decisive advantages over the conventional CI treatment, but also distinctly weaker TEO and separability properties in comparison with a full (and hermitian) ISR method

Controlling the accuracy of the density matrix renormalization group method: The Dynamical Block State Selection approach

We have applied the momentum space version of the Density Matrix Renormalization Group method ($k$-DMRG) in quantum chemistry in order to study the accuracy of the algorithm in the new context. We have shown numerically that it is possible to determine the desired accuracy of the method in advance of the calculations by dynamically controlling the truncation error and the number of block states using a novel protocol which we dubbed Dynamical Block State Selection (DBSS). The relationship between the real error and truncation error has been studied as a function of the number of orbitals and the fraction of filled orbitals. We have calculated the ground state of the molecules CH$_2$, H$_2$O, and F$_2$ as well as the first excited state of CH$_2$. Our largest calculations were carried out with 57 orbitals, the largest number of block states was 1500--2000, and the largest dimensions of the Hilbert space of the superblock configuration was 800.000--1.200.000.Comment: 12 page

State-of-the-Art Quantum Chemistry Meets Variable Reaction Coordinate Transition State Theory to Solve the Puzzling Case of the H2S + Cl System

The atmospheric reaction of H$_2$S with Cl has been reinvestigated to check if, as previously suggested, only explicit dynamical computations can lead to an accurate evaluation of the reaction rate because of strong recrossing effects and the breakdown of the variational extension of transition state theory. For this reason, the corresponding potential energy surface has been thoroughly investigated, thus leading to an accurate characterization of all stationary points, whose energetics has been computed at the state of the art. To this end, coupled-cluster theory including up to quadruple excitations has been employed, together with the extrapolation to the complete basis set limit and also incorporating core-valence correlation, spin-orbit, and scalar relativistic effects as well as diagonal Born-Oppenheimer corrections. This highly accurate composite scheme has also been paralleled by less expensive yet promising computational approaches. Moving to kinetics, variational transition state theory and its variable reaction coordinate extension for barrierless steps have been exploited, thus obtaining a reaction rate constant (8.16 x 10$^{-11}$ cm$^3$ molecule$^{-1}$ s$^{-1}$ at 300 K and 1 atm) in remarkable agreement with the experimental counterpart. Therefore, contrary to previous claims, there is no need to invoke any failure of the transition state theory, provided that sufficiently accurate quantum-chemical computations are performed. The investigation of the puzzling case of the H$_2$S + Cl system allowed us to present a robust approach for disclosing the thermochemistry and kinetics of reactions of atmospheric and astrophysical interest.Comment: 49 pages, 7 figures, published online in JCT