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arXiv:1109.3972

Hedin Equations, GW, GW+DMFT, and All That

Karsten Held, Ciro Taranto, G. Rohringer, A. Toschi

Published Sep 19, 2011• 8 citations
arXivHTMLPDF

Abstract

Historically, the GW approach was put forward by Hedin as the simplest approximation to the so-called Hedin equations. In Section 2, we will derive these Hedin equations from a Feynman-diagrammatical point of view. Section 3.1 shows how GW arises as an approximation to the Hedin equations. In Section 3.2, we briefly present some typical GW results for materials, including quasiparticle renormalizations, lifetimes, and band gap enhancements. In Section 4, the combination of GW and DMFT is summarized. Finally, as a prospective outlook, ab initio dynamical vertex approximation D$Γ$A is introduced in Section 5 as a unifying scheme for all that: GW, DMFT and non-local vertex correlations beyond.

DOI
10.48550/arxiv.1109.3972

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Historically, the GW approach was put forward by Hedin as the simplest approximation to the so-called Hedin equations. In Section 2, we will derive these Hedin equations from a Feynman-diagrammatical point of view. Section 3.1 shows how GW arises as an approximation to the Hedin equations. In Section 3.2, we briefly present some typical GW results for materials, including quasiparticle renormalizations, lifetimes, and band gap enhancements. In Section 4, the combination of GW and DMFT is summarized. Finally, as a prospective outlook, ab initio dynamical vertex approximation DΓΓΓA is introduced in Section 5 as a unifying scheme for all that: GW, DMFT and non-local vertex correlations beyond.
In many ways the solution to the Hedin equations represents an exact solution to the many body problem. However, for most systems of practical interest, the solution to the Hedin equations is rendered nearly numerically intractable because the Hedin equations are of functional derivative form. Integral equations, on the other hand, are much more numerically tractable, than functional derivative equations, as they can often be solved iteratively. In this work we present a systematic set of integral equations (with no functional derivatives) - Hedin approximations I, II, III, IV etc. - whose solutions converge to the solutions of the exact Hedin equations. The Hedin approximations are well suited to iterative numerical solutions (which we also describe). Furthermore Hedin approximation I is just the GW approximation (as such this work may be viewed as a systematic improvement of the GW approximation). We present a systematic study of the Hedin equations for zero dimensional field theory (which, in particular, is a method to enumerate Feynman diagrams for field theories in arbitrary dimensions) and show better and better convergence to the solutions of the Hedin equations for higher and higher Hedin approximations, with Hedin approximations I, II and III being explicitly studied. We, in particular, show that the higher Hedin approximations capture more and and more Feynman diagrams for the self energy. We also show that already Hedin approximation II captures more diagrams than the state of the art diagrammatic vertex corrections approach. Furthermore Hedin approximation III is a near perfect match to the exact solutions of the Hedin equations, at least in the zero dimensional case, and enumerates a large number of Feynman diagrams.
In this chapter, shortcomings of the GW approximation are analyzed, and different ways are proposed to go beyond. The approaches fall into three broad classes: first, one can iterate Hedin's equations that link the self-energy, the polarizability, the screened Coulomb interaction, and the vertex function with the Dyson equation for the one-body Green's function. Second, one can use other Dyson equations like in the T-matrix approach, and third, one can make an ansatz for the one-body Green's function inspired by physical considerations or insight from models, in particular the idea of electron–boson coupling that leads to the cumulant expansion. Applications are given for illustration. Some more ideas and links to subsequent chapters provide an outlook. The GW approximation is a widely used approach in computational electronic structure. However, the previous chapters show some severe limitations. One example is systems with low-energy excitations, as illustrated by the Hubbard dimer in the dissociation limit, where bonding and antibonding orbitals become degenerate. This can be seen in Sec. 11.7. Another example is satellite series, for example in the photoemission spectrum of silicon in Sec. 13.1. Moreover, even in a situation where the approximation is well justified, it induces some error, though maybe small, and one eventually wants to do better. The full self-energy functional is in principle known: it is the Luttinger–Ward sum of skeleton diagrams derived from Eq. (11.35). However, this is an infinite sum, and no closed form of the result is known. Hence, the task is not to invent new diagrams: it is to make a choice of diagrams or combinations of diagrams, which are evaluated fully or in an approximate way. This is the framework of the present chapter. In some cases we will add diagrams to the GWA ones, which gives rise to vertex corrections ; in other cases some of the GWA diagrams are neglected while different ones are taken into account. An example is the T-matrix approximation, which sums ladder diagrams instead of bubbles. In general one tries to combine this with the GWA, especially in extended systems where screening is important. Therefore the GWA plays a prominent role, and the whole chapter is called beyond GW . The chapter contains advanced material, that is in part exploratory and refers to current research. It is intended to make links to communities outside the GW world, and to other chapters.
Hedin's equations provide an elegant route to compute the exact one-body Green's function (or propagator) via the self-consistent iteration of a set of nonlinear equations. Its first-order approximation, known as GWGWGW, corresponds to a resummation of ring diagrams and has shown to be extremely successful in physics and chemistry. Systematic improvement is possible, although challenging, via the introduction of vertex corrections. Considering anomalous propagators and an external pairing potential, we derive a self-consistent set of closed equations equivalent to the famous Hedin equations but having as a first-order approximation, the particle-particle (pp) TTT-matrix approximation, where one performs a resummation of the ladder diagrams. This pp version of Hedin's equations offers a way to go systematically beyond the TTT-matrix approximation by accounting for low-order pp vertex corrections.
Abstract The question of spatial locality of electronic correlations beyond GW approximation is one of the central issues of the famous combination of GW and dynamical mean field theory, GW + DMFT. In this work, the above question is addressed directly (for the first time) by performing calculations with and without assumption of locality of the corresponding diagrams. For this purpose we use sc(GW + G3W2) approach where the higher order part (G3W2) is evaluated with fully momentum dependent Green’s function G and screened interaction W and with ‘local’ variant, where the single site approximation is assumed for both G and W. For all three materials studied in this work (NiO, α -Ce, LiFeAs), we have found the spatial non-locality effects to be strong. For NiO and LiFeAs they, in fact, are decisive for the proper evaluation of vertex corrections. The results of this study have direct impact on our understanding of approximations made in practical implementations of GW + DMFT method, where all diagrams beyond GW (DMFT part) are assumed to be local. Taking into account the fact that the first diagrams beyond GW represent the most important contribution also in GW + DMFT calculations, we conclude that the basic assumption of GW + DMFT, namely the locality of diagrams evaluated in the DMFT part, is not as good as it is believed to be.