Making the random phase approximation to electronic correlation accurate

Author(s)
Andreas Grüneis, Martijn Marsman, Judith Harl, Laurids Schimka, Georg Kresse
Abstract

We show that the inclusion of second-order screened exchange to the random phase approximation allows for an accurate description of electronic correlation in atoms and solids clearly surpassing the random phase approximation, but not yet approaching chemical accuracy. From a fundamental point of view, the method is self-correlation free for one-electron systems. From a practical point of view, the approach yields correlation energies for atoms, as well as for the jellium electron gas within a few kcal/mol of exact values, atomization energies within typically 2–3 kcal/mol of experiment, and excellent lattice constants for ionic and covalently bonded solids (0.2% error). The computational complexity is only O(N5), comparable to canonical second-order Møller–Plesset perturbation theory, which should allow for routine calculations on many systems.

Organisation(s)
Computational Materials Physics
External organisation(s)
Center for Computational Materials Science, CMS
Journal
Journal of Chemical Physics
Volume
131
No. of pages
5
ISSN
0021-9606
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1063/1.3250347
Publication date
2009
Peer reviewed
Yes
Austrian Fields of Science 2012
103009 Solid state physics, 103015 Condensed matter, 103025 Quantum mechanics, 103036 Theoretical physics
Portal url
https://ucrisportal.univie.ac.at/en/publications/making-the-random-phase-approximation-to-electronic-correlation-accurate(5d7834d7-dd5d-4be3-b8f8-add01485bcc5).html