Theoretical molecular spectroscopy of actinide compounds: The ThO molecule

The tiny-core generalized (Gatchina) relativistic pseudopotential (GRPP) model provides an accurate approximation for many-electron Hamiltonians of molecules containing heavy atoms, ensuring a proper description of the effects of non-Coulombian electron-electron interactions, electronic self-energy and vacuum polarization. Combining this model with electron correlation treatment in the frames of the intermediate Hamiltonian Fock space coupled cluster theory employing incomplete main model spaces, one obtains a reliable and economical tool for excited state modeling. The performance of this method is assessed in applications to \textit{ab initio} modeling of excited electronic states of the thorium monoxide molecule with term energies below 20000 cm$^{-1}$. Radiative lifetimes of excited states are estimated using truncated expansions of effective and metric operators in powers of cluster amplitudes

Generalized relativistic small-core pseudopotentials accounting for quantum electrodynamic effects: construction and pilot applications

A simple procedure to incorporate one-loop quantum electrodynamic (QED) corrections into the generalized (Gatchina) nonlocal shape-consistent relativistic pseudopotential model is described. The pseudopotentials for Lu, Tl, and Ra replacing only inner core shells (with principal quantum numbers $n\le 3$ for the two former elements and $n\le 4$ for the latter one) are derived from the solutions of reference atomic SCF problems with the Dirac-Coulomb-Breit Hamiltonian to which the model Lamb shift operator added. QED contributions to atomic valence excitation energies evaluated at the SCF level are demonstrated to exceed the errors introduced by the pseudopotential approximation itself by an order of magnitude. Pilot applications of the new model to calculations of excitation energies of two-valence-electron atomic systems using the intermediate-Hamiltonian relativistic Fock space coupled cluster method reformulated here for incomplete main model spaces are reported. Implications for high-accuracy molecular excited state calculations are discussed

Optical cycling in charged complexes with Ra-N bonds

The extension of laser cooling and trapping techniques to polyatomic molecular ions would have advanced scientific applications such as search of physics outside of the Standard Model, ultracold chemistry etc. We apply the Fock space relativistic coupled cluster method to study low-lying electronic states of molecular ions with Ra--N bonds, namely RaNCH$^+$, RaNH$^+_3$ and RaNCCH$^+_3$. Prospects of laser cooling of these species are estimated, and the peculiarities of unpaired-electron distributions are analyzed from the point of view of the molecular electronic structure. RaNH$^+_3$ and RaNCCH$^+_3$ are the first symmetric top molecular ions expected to be suitable for direct laser cooling

Compound-tunable embedding potential method to model local electronic excitations on ff-element ions in solids: Pilot relativistic coupled cluster study of Ce and Th impurities in yttrium orthophosphate, YPO4_4

A method to simulate local properties and processes in crystals with impurities via constructing cluster models within the frame of the compound-tunable embedding potential (CTEP) and highly-accurate {\it ab initio} relativistic molecular-type electronic structure calculations is developed and applied to the Ce and Th-doped yttrium orthophosphate crystals, YPO$_4$, having xenotime structure. Two embedded cluster models are considered, the "minimal" one, YO$_8$@CTEP$_{\rm min}$, consisting of the central Y$^{3+}$ cation and its first coordination sphere of eight O$^{2-}$ anions (i.~e.\ with broken P--O bonds), and its extended counterpart, Y(PO$_4$)$_6$@CTEP$_{\rm ext}$, implying the full treatment of all atoms of the PO$_4^{3-}$ anions nearest to the central Y$^{3+}$ cation. CTEP$_{\rm min,ext}$ denote here the corresponding cluster environment described within the CTEP method. The relativistic Fock-space coupled cluster (FS RCC) theory is applied to the minimal cluster model to study electronic excitations localized on Ce$^{3+}$ and Th$^{3+}$ impurity ions. Calculated transition energies for the cerium-doped xenotime are in a good agreement with the available experimental data (mean absolute deviation of ca.0.3 eV for $4f{\to}5d$ type transitions). For the thorium-doped crystal the picture of electronic states is predicted to be quite complicated, the ground state is expected to be of the $6d$ character. The uncertainty for the excitation energies of thorium-doped xenotime is estimated to be within 0.35 eV. Radiative lifetimes of excited states are calculated at the FS RCC level for both doped crystals. The calculated lifetime of the lowest $5d$ state of Ce$^{3+}$ differs from the experimentally measured one by no more than twice