Local effective potential theory, both stationary-state and time-dependent, constitutes the mapping from a system of electrons in an external field to one of the noninteracting fermions possessing the same basic variable such as the density, thereby enabling the determination of the energy and other properties of the electronic system. This paper is a description via Quantal Density Functional Theory (QDFT) of the electron correlations that must be accounted for in such a mapping. It is proved through QDFT that independent of the form of external field, (a) it is possible to map to a model system possessing all the basic variables; and that (b) with the requirement that the model fermions are subject to the same external fields, the only correlations that must be considered are those due to the Pauli exclusion principle, Coulomb repulsion, and Correlation–Kinetic effects. The cases of both a static and time-dependent electromagnetic field, for which the basic variables are the density and physical current density, are considered. The examples of solely an external electrostatic or time-dependent electric field constitute special cases. An efficacious unification in terms of electron correlations, independent of the type of external field, is thereby achieved. The mapping is explicated for the example of a quantum dot in a magnetostatic field, and for a quantum dot in a magnetostatic and time-dependent electric field.
Local effective potential theory, both stationary-state and time-dependent, constitutes the mapping from a system of electrons in an external field to one of the noninteracting fermions possessing the same basic variable such as the density, thereby enabling the determination of the energy and other properties of the electronic system. This paper is a description via Quantal Density Functional Theory (QDFT) of the electron correlations that must be accounted for in such a mapping. It is proved through QDFT that independent of the form of external field, (a) it is possible to map to a model system possessing all the basic variables; and that (b) with the requirement that the model fermions are subject to the same external fields, the only correlations that must be considered are those due to the Pauli exclusion principle, Coulomb repulsion, and Correlation–Kinetic effects. The cases of both a static and time-dependent electromagnetic field, for which the basic variables are the density and physical current density, are considered. The examples of solely an external electrostatic or time-dependent electric field constitute special cases. An efficacious unification in terms of electron correlations, independent of the type of external field, is thereby achieved. The mapping is explicated for the example of a quantum dot in a magnetostatic field, and for a quantum dot in a magnetostatic and time-dependent electric field.
Local effective potential theory of electronic structure is the mapping from a system of electrons in an external field to one of noninteracting fermions or bosons with the same electronic density. The energy and ionization potential are also thereby determined. The mappings may be achieved via either quantal density-functional theory (QDFT) or Hohenberg-Kohn-Sham density-functional theory (HKS-DFT). The wave function for the model fermionic system is a Slater determinant of spin orbitals, whereas that for the model bosons is the density amplitude. In the QDFT mappings, the contributions of the electron correlations due to the Pauli exclusion principle, Coulomb repulsion and correlation-kinetic effects are separately delineated. It has been proved via QDFT that the contribution of Pauli and Coulomb correlations to these model systems is the same; the difference lies solely in their correlation-kinetic component. In this paper, we apply the QDFT of the density amplitude to study the mapping to the bosonic model. The application is to atoms and performed at the Hartree-Fock theory level of electron correlations. A principal conclusion is that correlation-kinetic effects play a significant role in the mapping to the bosonic model, whereas they are negligible in the mapping to the model fermions. For the bosonic model, this contribution increases with electron number, becoming nearly as significant as those due to the corresponding electron-interaction (the sum of the Hartree and Pauli) term. The significance of the correlation-kinetic effects will be further enhanced on the inclusion of Coulomb correlations and the corresponding correlation-kinetic contributions. The consequences of these conclusions for the HKS-DFT of the density amplitude are discussed, as are directions for future work.
Time-dependent quantal density-functional theory (Q-DFT) is a description of the s-system of noninteracting fermions with electronic density equivalent to that of Schr\"odinger theory, in terms of fields whose sources are quantum-mechanical expectations of Hermitian operators. The theory delineates and defines the contribution of each type of electron correlation to the local electron-interaction potential ${\ensuremath{\nu}}_{\mathrm{ee}}(\mathbf{r},t)$ of the s system. These correlations are due to the Pauli exclusion principle, Coulomb repulsion, correlation-kinetic, and correlation-current-density effects, the latter two resulting, respectively, from the difference in kinetic energy and current density between the interacting Schr\"odinger and noninteracting systems. We employ Q-DFT to prove the following sum rules and properties of the s system: (i) the components of the potential due to these correlations separately exert no net force on the system; (ii) the torque of the potential is finite and due solely to correlation-current-density effects; (iii) two sum rules involving the curl of the dynamic electron-interaction kernel defined as the functional derivative of ${\ensuremath{\nu}}_{\mathrm{ee}}(\mathbf{r},t)$ are derived and shown to depend on the frequency dependent correlation-current-density effect. Furthermore, via adiabatic coupling constant (\ensuremath{\lambda}) perturbation theory, we prove: (iv) the exchange potential ${\ensuremath{\nu}}_{x}(\mathbf{r},t)$ is the work done in a conservative field representative of Pauli correlations and lowest-order $O(\ensuremath{\lambda})$ correlation-kinetic and correlation-current-density effects; (v) the correlation potential ${\ensuremath{\nu}}_{c}(\mathbf{r},t)$ commences in $O({\ensuremath{\lambda}}^{2}),$ and, at each order, it is the work done in a conservative field representative of Coulomb correlations and correlation-kinetic and correlation-current-density effects; (vi) we derive the integral virial theorem relating ${\ensuremath{\nu}}_{\mathrm{ee}}(\mathbf{r},t)$ to the electron-interaction and correlation-kinetic energy for arbitrary coupling constant strength \ensuremath{\lambda}, and show there are no explicit correlation-current-density contributions to the energy. From this integral virial theorem we (vii) obtain the fully interacting $(\ensuremath{\lambda}=1)$ and exchange-only $(\ensuremath{\lambda}=0)$ integral virial theorems as special cases, the latter showing there is no explicit correlation-kinetic contribution to the exchange energy; and (viii) write expressions for the electron-interaction and correlation-kinetic actions for arbitrary coupling constant \ensuremath{\lambda} in terms of the corresponding fields.
The formally exact expression of the exchange-correlation potential in the local-scaling density functional theory (LSDFT) was derived recently by the author, and it is equivalent to that of Holas and March. The basic equation of the LS-DFT was also derived, and it is equivalent to the differential virial theorem (DVT). The LS-DFT has been extended to the local-scaling current density functional theory (LS-CDFT). This has been compared with the formulation of Holas and March. In this note, the LS-CDFT is extended to the timedependent system; i.e., the local-scaling time-dependent current density functional theory (LS-TDCDFT) is formulated. As a straightforward extension of ref. 3, the density and the paramagnetic current density jp are adopted as the basic variables, which is the same procedure used by Colwell et al. It is explicitly shown that the time-dependent exchange-correlation scalar potential vxc and the vector one Axc are same functionals of firstand second-order density matrices as those of the time-independent case, while the total effective potentials are not so. The equation of motion of jp provides the DVT for the time-dependent system in the magnetic field. The time-dependent term of the DVT is equal to that of the nonmagnetic time-dependent system. Throughout the entire formulation, the notation of the tensor product is suppressed. Here, an N-electron system in an external scalar potential vextðr; tÞ, an external vector potential Aextðr; tÞ, and an interaction potential uðr; r0Þ 1⁄4 =jr r0j is considered, where is the coupling constant treated as a variable parameter. In a time-independent theory, the quantity to be minimized is the energy. But in the time-dependent case, the action S plays the role:
The Wigner regime of a system of electrons in an external field is characterized by a low electron density and a high electron-interaction energy relative to the kinetic energy. The low-correlation regime is in turn described by a high electron density and an electron-interaction energy smaller than the kinetic energy. The Wigner regime of a nonuniform-electron-density system is investigated via quantal density functional theory (QDFT). Within QDFT, the contributions of electron correlations due to the Pauli exclusion principle, Coulomb repulsion, and correlation-kinetic effects are separately delineated and explicitly defined. The nonuniform-electron-density system studied is that of the Hooke's atom in the Wigner regime, for which the exact wave function is derived. As such, the results of the QDFT analysis are exact. It is observed that in comparison to the low-correlation case, not only is the electron-interaction energy greater than the kinetic energy as a fraction of the total energy, but so are its individual Hartree, Pauli, and Coulomb components. The ionization potential as a fraction of the total energy too is greater. But most significantly, in the Wigner regime, the correlation-kinetic energy as a fraction of both the electron-interaction and the total energy is substantially greater than in the low-correlation case. Hence, we propose that the Wigner regime now also be characterized by a high correlation-kinetic energy. The kinetic energy as a fraction of the total energy, however, is less than in the low-correlation case. This fact and the high correlation-kinetic energy value in the Wigner regime is explained by the concept of “quantal compression” of the kinetic energy density derived from QDFT. The corresponding results for the low-correlation case are in turn a consequence of a “quantal decompression” of the kinetic energy density. From the QDFT analysis, the exact values for the Kohn-Sham theory “exchange-correlation” and “correlation” energy functionals of the density and their respective functional derivatives are also obtained. These results ought to be of value in the construction and testing of approximate energy functionals valid for the Wigner regime.
Providing sufficient accuracy at low-computational cost, not surprisingly, density-functional theory ( DFT ) is a standard tool in theoretical material science. Similarly, quantum-electrodynamical density-functional theory ( QEDFT ) provides a promising route to describe experiments at the interface of quantum optics and quantum chemistry. Formally, in the Kohn-Sham ( KS ) formulation of DFT and QEDFT the exact many-particle Schrödinger equation is replaced by a set of coupled non-linear one-particle differential equations. The electron-electron, the electron-ion and the electron-photon interactions of the interacting system are mimicked by their corresponding effective KS potential with an, in principle unknown exchange-correlation ( xc ) term. In practice, DFT and QEDFT require approximations for this xc potential. The quality of which fully determines how much the DFT and QEDFT observables deviate from the exact ones. Understanding the shortcomings and improving the quality of approximate functionals makes the study of the exact functional of model systems indispensable. Here, we employ exact diagonalization for the Hamiltonian of different types of real-space lattice models in one spatial dimension to access the ground-state wave function, and thus to explicitly construct the exact functionals of DFT and QEDFT . To study the functional behavior of purely electronic systems, we consider two singlet-state electrons moving in an external potential with two connected atomic wells of variable depth and distance. To study coupled electron-photon systems, we consider the Rabi Hamiltonian with variable electron-photon coupling strength. By varying the model parameters, we systematically construct the functionals for systems from weak to strong coupling between the building blocks of the global system. Using the concept of the effective density-to- potential map, we discuss the intrasystem steepening which is an exact condition on the xc functional that captures the static correlation present in the system and carve out how it relates to the well-known intersystem derivative discontinuity. We further construct arbitrary observables as functionals of the internal variables which are directly affected by such features of the effective density-to-potential map. By constructing the reduced dipole map in the four-particle case of coupled electron-photon system, we show that the density-to-potential map helps to identify and understand recently discovered physical effects in the field of strongly coupled electron-photon systems. This work provides a contribution to the development of approximate function- als required in practical density-functional calculations of arbitrary experimentally accessible observables. Both the intrasystem steepening and the intersystem derivative discontinuity play a crucial role for systems with highly-localized electrons. Including both features in approximate functionals will improve the accu- racy of DFT evaluation of observables for such systems. Those results provide novel insight into the properties of the exact xc potentials in QEDFT . This work opens a new route to construct new functionals using coarse-grained or embed- ding approaches within the general and exact frameworks of DFT and QEDFT.