We develop a systematic approach to construct energy functionals of the one-particle reduced density matrix (1RDM) for equilibrium systems at finite temperature. The starting point of our formulation is the grand potential Ω [ G ] regarded as variational functional of the Green’s function G based on diagrammatic many-body perturbation theory and for which we consider either the Klein or Luttinger–Ward form. By restricting the input Green’s function to be one-to-one related to a set on one-particle reduced density matrices (1RDM) this functional becomes a functional of the 1RDM. To establish the one-to-one mapping we use that, at any finite temperature and for a given 1RDM γ in a finite basis, there exists a non-interacting system with a spatially non-local potential v [ γ ] which reproduces the given 1RDM. The corresponding set of non-interacting Green’s functions defines the variational domain of the functional Ω . In the zero temperature limit we obtain an energy functional E [ γ ] which by minimisation yields an approximate ground state 1RDM and energy. As an application of the formalism we use the Klein and Luttinger–Ward functionals in the GW-approximation to compute the binding curve of a model hydrogen molecule using an extended Hubbard Hamiltonian. We compare further to the case in which we evaluate the functionals on a Hartree–Fock and a Kohn–Sham Green’s function. We find that the Luttinger–Ward version of the functionals performs the best and is able to reproduce energies close to the GW energy which corresponds to the stationary point.
We develop a systematic approach to construct energy functionals of the one-particle reduced density matrix (1RDM) for equilibrium systems at finite temperature. The starting point of our formulation is the grand potential Ω [ G ] regarded as variational functional of the Green’s function G based on diagrammatic many-body perturbation theory and for which we consider either the Klein or Luttinger–Ward form. By restricting the input Green’s function to be one-to-one related to a set on one-particle reduced density matrices (1RDM) this functional becomes a functional of the 1RDM. To establish the one-to-one mapping we use that, at any finite temperature and for a given 1RDM γ in a finite basis, there exists a non-interacting system with a spatially non-local potential v [ γ ] which reproduces the given 1RDM. The corresponding set of non-interacting Green’s functions defines the variational domain of the functional Ω . In the zero temperature limit we obtain an energy functional E [ γ ] which by minimisation yields an approximate ground state 1RDM and energy. As an application of the formalism we use the Klein and Luttinger–Ward functionals in the GW-approximation to compute the binding curve of a model hydrogen molecule using an extended Hubbard Hamiltonian. We compare further to the case in which we evaluate the functionals on a Hartree–Fock and a Kohn–Sham Green’s function. We find that the Luttinger–Ward version of the functionals performs the best and is able to reproduce energies close to the GW energy which corresponds to the stationary point.
We present an ab initio approach for grand-canonical ensembles in thermal equilibrium (eq) with local or nonlocal external potentials based on the one-reduced density matrix (1RDM). We show that equilibrium properties of a grand-canonical ensemble are determined uniquely by the eq-1RDM and establish a variational principle for the grand potential with respect to its 1RDM. We further prove the existence of a Kohn-Sham system capable of reproducing the 1RDM of an interacting system at finite temperature. Utilizing this Kohn-Sham system as an unperturbed system, we deduce a many-body approach to iteratively construct approximations to the correlation contribution of the grand potential.
The exact reduced density-matrix functional is derived from the Luttinger-Ward functional of the single-particle Green's function. Thereby, a formal link is provided between diagrammatic many-body approaches using Green's functions on the one hand and theories based on many-body wave functions on the other. This link can be used to explicitly construct approximations for the density-matrix functional that are equivalent to standard diagrammatic resummation techniques and to nonperturbative dynamical mean field theory in particular. Contrary to functionals of the Green's function, the exact density-matrix functional is convex and thus provides a true minimum principle which facilitates the calculation of the grand potential and derived equilibrium properties. The benefits of the proposed Green's-function-based density-matrix functional theory for geometrical structure optimization of strongly correlated materials are discussed.
We investigate analytically the performance of many-body energy functionals, derived by Klein, Luttinger, and Ward, at different levels of diagrammatic approximations, ranging from second Born, to , to the so-called T matrix, for the calculation of total energies and potential energy surfaces. We benchmark our theoretical results on the extended two-site Hubbard model, which is analytically solvable and for which several exact properties can be calculated. Despite its simplicity, this model displays the physics of strongly correlated electrons: it is prototypical of the H 2 dissociation, a notoriously difficult problem to solve accurately for the majority of mean-field-based approaches. We show that both functionals exhibit good to excellent variational properties, particularly in the case of the Luttinger-Ward one, which is in close agreement with fully self-consistent calculations, and we elucidate the relation between the accuracy of the results and the different input one-body Green's functions. Provided that these are wisely chosen, we show how the Luttinger-Ward functional can be used as a computationally inexpensive alternative to fully self-consistent many-body calculations, without sacrificing the precision of the results obtained. Furthermore, in virtue of this accuracy, we argue that this functional can also be used to rank different many-body approximations at different regimes of electronic correlation, once again bypassing the need for self-consistency. Published by the American Physical Society 2024
In parallel with standard density-functional theory, we study the energy of the ground state of a finite many-body system as a functional of the one-particle density matrix. We show that the formulation of a variational principle that is valid beyond the Hartree-Fock limit requires that two-body correlations be included not only in the ground-state energy but also in the constraints. As an illustration, we apply a linear-response argument to derive formulas for first-order corrections to the Hartree-Fock density matrix. Further analysis suggests an approach in terms of the density matrix of an independent-particle system, which can be introduced by the application of an alternative variational principle. This approach is reminiscent of Kohn-Sham theory, but the effective external potential is not required to be local. This variational method can be implemented in a systematic fashion by means of the linked-cluster expansion. In an appendix we study a variant of the Hohenberg-Kohn theorem for nonlocal potentials.
We establish one-body reduced density matrix (1RDM) functional theory for the canonical ensemble in a finite basis set at an elevated temperature. Including temperature guarantees the differentiability of the universal functional by occupying all states and additionally not fully occupying the states in a fermionic system. We use the convexity of the universal functional and invertibility of the potential-to-1RDM map to show that the subgradient contains only one element which is equivalent to differentiability. This allows us to show that all 1RDMs with a purely fractional occupation number spectrum ($0<{n}_{i}<1\phantom{\rule{0.28em}{0ex}}{\ensuremath{\forall}}_{i}$) are uniquely v-representable up to a constant.
To avoid confusion, it is necessary to be quite explicit about what is assumed and what is to be proved. A. Klein, Phys. Rev. 121, 950 (1961) Summary The topic of this chapter is functionals that provide a concise formulation for thermodynamic quantities and Green's function methods in interacting many-body systems. Building upon the instructive examples of density functional theory and the Hartree– Fock approximation, functionals of the Green's function are developed to provide a framework for practical methods used extensively in many-body perturbation theory (Chs. 9–15), dynamical mean-field theory (Chs. 16–20), and their combination in Ch. 21. Functional concepts give a firm foundation for those methods, for example, they give the conditions for approximations to obey conservation laws. Additional background and specific aspects are in App. H. Many physical quantities can be expressed as functionals , i.e., they depend on an entire function.1 For example, in the quantum variational method to determine a wavefunction, the total energy of a system of many electrons is a functional of a many-body trial wavefunction ( r 1 , r 2 , …): it is the expectation value of the hamiltonian. At the variational minimum, assuming the trial wavefunction is completely flexible, one finds the many-body Schrödinger equation for the ground state. Many of the properties we are interested in are, formally, simple functionals of the ground- or excited-state wavefunctions. In the search for feasible ways to calculate properties such as excitation spectra, we are led to different types of functional. The idea is to deal only with a physical, measurable quantity Q of interest and a variational functional E [ Q ] of this quantity. The variational character of E allows one to derive equations that determine Q 0 , the value of Q for the system in a desired state, typically the ground state or equilibrium state at T ≠ 0. Other properties should be different functionals F m [ Q ] that can then be evaluated at Q = Q 0 . This strategy is outlined in Fig. 8.1. To appreciate the power of such approaches, one can consider the impact of density functional theory, which is formulated as a functional of the density n ( r ) of electrons; it is defined for a range of densities and the variational minimum for the energy functional E [ n ] leads to equations to determine the actual ground-state density n 0 ( r ) and total energy E 0 .