Challenges
Datasets
Workspaces
Papers
Discussions
Leaderboard
Log inSign up
Challenges
Datasets
Workspaces
Papers
Discussions
Leaderboard
Blog
Job Board
Q3AS

© 2026 Aqora Quantum S.A.S.

TermsPrivacyLegal Notice

Physica Scripta

Direct variational determination of two-particle reduced density matrices for ground and excited states of N-boson systems using the dispersion operator approach

Diego R. Alcoba, P. Capuzzi, Alicia Torre, Luis Laín, Ofelia B. Oña, Gustavo E. Massaccesi, J. Dukelsky

Published Mar 19, 2026• 0 citations
Publisher

Abstract

Abstract This work deals with the variational determination of two-particle reduced density matrices corresponding to eigenstates of N -boson systems. Stringent N -representability conditions have been imposed in the variational treatment, in which the resulting optimization problem is addressed within a standard semidefinite programming framework. A unified variational treatment, based on the dispersion operator technique, is proposed. This treatment allows to determine ground- and excited-state energies and their corresponding reduced density matrices, which have been evaluated in systems formulated by means of simple Hamiltonians. We report results from different N -representability levels of treatment. These results are compared with those arising from the full configuration interaction procedure, what allows to point out the relevance of the imposed N -representability conditions. We also highlight the differences found in applying this methodology to fermion and boson systems.

DOI
10.1088/1402-4896/ae54dc

Related papers

Variational determination of ground and excited-state two-electron reduced density matrices in the doubly occupied configuration space: A dispersion operator approach

Diego R. Alcoba, Ofelia B. Oña, Luis Laín +6 more

This work implements a variational determination of the elements of two-electron reduced density matrices corresponding to the ground and excited states of N-electron interacting systems based on the dispersion operator technique. The procedure extends the previously reported proposal [Nakata et al., J. Chem. Phys. 125, 244109 (2006)] to two-particle interaction Hamiltonians and N-representability conditions for the two-, three-, and four-particle reduced density matrices in the doubly occupied configuration interaction space. The treatment has been applied to describe electronic spectra using two benchmark exactly solvable pairing models: reduced Bardeen-Cooper-Schrieffer and Richardson-Gaudin-Kitaev Hamiltonians. The dispersion operator combined with N-representability conditions up to the four-particle reduced density matrices provides excellent results.

The Journal of Chemical Physics•Jun 10, 2021•12 citations

Influence of the N-representability conditions on the variational determination of two-electron reduced density matrices for ground and excited N-electron states in the doubly occupied configuration interaction space

Dario A. Corvalan, Ofelia B. Oña, Diego R. Alcoba +3 more

In this work, we analyze the effectiveness of different sets of well-known necessary N-representability conditions that are imposed on the variational determination of two-electron reduced density matrices corresponding to the ground and excited states of N-electron Hamiltonians within doubly occupied configuration interaction subspaces. The two-electron reduced density matrix elements are determined so that they are suitably related to those of higher-order reduced density matrices and other associated matrices, up to a given order, constituting positive semidefinite matrices. These conditions up to two-, three-, and four-order have been sequentially imposed on the variational calculation of the expectation values of the dispersion operator corresponding to several Hamiltonian models, obtaining the electronic spectra. These results have been contrasted with those arising from the full configuration interaction method, illuminating the sufficiency/insufficiency of the variational N-representability conditions applied.

The Journal of Chemical Physics•Nov 7, 2022•9 citations

Direct variational determination of the two-electron reduced density matrix for doubly occupied-configuration-interaction wave functions: The influence of three-index N-representability conditions

Diego R. Alcoba, Alicia Torre, Luis Laín +7 more

This work proposes the variational determination of two-electron reduced density matrices corresponding to the ground state of N-electron systems within the doubly occupied-configuration-interaction methodology. The P, Q, and G two-index N-representability conditions have been extended to the T1 and T2 (T2') three-index ones and the resulting optimization problem has been addressed using a standard semidefinite program. We report results obtained from the doubly occupied-configuration-interaction method, from the two-index constraint variational procedure and from the two- and three-index constraint variational treatment. The discussion of these results along with a study of the computational cost demanded shows the usefulness of our proposal.

The Journal of Chemical Physics•Jan 9, 2018•37 citations

Boson correlation energies via variational minimization with the two-particle reduced density matrix: Exact N -representability conditions for harmonic interactions

Gergely Gidofalvi, David A. Mazziotti

A many-body theory for interacting bosons is developed within the framework of minimizing the ground-state energy with respect to the two-particle reduced-density matrix (2-RDM) subject to $N$-representability conditions. The $N$-representability conditions, which ensure that the 2-RDM may be derived from an $N$-particle wave function, are imposed through a hierarchy of positivity conditions where the $p$-positivity conditions restrict the metric matrices for $p∕2$-body operators to be positive semidefinite. Using two-positivity, we minimize the ground-state energies of $5--10 000$ harmonically interacting bosons in a harmonic external potential. The energies and 2-RDMs obtained are in agreement with the exact solution except for round-off errors, which implies that for this class of boson interactions two-positivity conditions alone yield exact results for any interaction strength. The ground-state energies obtained at strong interactions are more accurate than many-body perturbative techniques by many orders of magnitude.

Physical Review A•Apr 16, 2004•42 citations

Reduced density matrix approach to ultracold few-fermion systems in one dimension

Mitchell J. Knight, Harry M. Quiney, Andy M Martin

Abstract The variational determination of the two-fermion reduced density matrix (2-RDM) is described for harmonically trapped, ultracold few-fermion systems in one dimension with equal spin populations. This is accomplished by formulating the problem as a semi-definite program, with the 2-RDM being subject to well-knownN-representability conditions. The ground-state energies, as well as the density, pair-correlation function, and lower-order eigenvalues of the 2-RDM of various fermionic systems are found by utilising an augmented Lagrangian method for semi-definite programming. The ground-state energies are found to match well to those determined by full-configuration interaction and coupled-cluster calculations and the density, pair-correlation function, and eigenvalue results demonstrate that the salient features of these systems are well-described by this method. These results collectively demonstrate the utility of the reduced density matrix method firstly in describing strong correlation arising from short-range interactions, suggesting that the well-knownN-representability conditions are sufficient to model ultracold fermionic systems, and secondly in illustrating the prospect of treating larger systems currently out of the reach of established methods.

arXiv:2106.09187•New Journal of Physics•Apr 5, 2022•14 citations

Variational determination of the two-particle density matrix as a quantum many-body technique

Brecht Verstichel

In this thesis the variational optimisation of the density matrix is discussed as a method in many-body quantum mechanics. This is a relatively unknown technique in which one tries to obtain the two-particle reduced density matrix directly in a variational approach. In the first Chapter we introduce the subject in the broader context of many-body quantum mechanics, and briefly sketch the history of the field. The second Chapter tries to summarise what is known about N-representability of reduced density matrices, and derives these results in a unified framework. The optimisation problem can be formulated as a semidefinite program. Three different algorithms are discussed in Chapter three, and their performance is compared. In Chapter four we show how symmetry can be exploited to reduce the computational cost considerably. Several applications of the method are discussed in Chapter five. We show that the standard two-index constraints fail in the strong-correlation limit of the one-dimensional Hubbard model. In Chapter six we identify the spin-adapted lifting conditions as the most compact constraints that can correctly describe this limit.

arXiv:1203.5659•Mar 26, 2012•4 citations
Abstract This work deals with the variational determination of two-particle reduced density matrices corresponding to eigenstates of N -boson systems. Stringent N -representability conditions have been imposed in the variational treatment, in which the resulting optimization problem is addressed within a standard semidefinite programming framework. A unified variational treatment, based on the dispersion operator technique, is proposed. This treatment allows to determine ground- and excited-state energies and their corresponding reduced density matrices, which have been evaluated in systems formulated by means of simple Hamiltonians. We report results from different N -representability levels of treatment. These results are compared with those arising from the full configuration interaction procedure, what allows to point out the relevance of the imposed N -representability conditions. We also highlight the differences found in applying this methodology to fermion and boson systems.
This work implements a variational determination of the elements of two-electron reduced density matrices corresponding to the ground and excited states of N-electron interacting systems based on the dispersion operator technique. The procedure extends the previously reported proposal [Nakata et al., J. Chem. Phys. 125, 244109 (2006)] to two-particle interaction Hamiltonians and N-representability conditions for the two-, three-, and four-particle reduced density matrices in the doubly occupied configuration interaction space. The treatment has been applied to describe electronic spectra using two benchmark exactly solvable pairing models: reduced Bardeen-Cooper-Schrieffer and Richardson-Gaudin-Kitaev Hamiltonians. The dispersion operator combined with N-representability conditions up to the four-particle reduced density matrices provides excellent results.
In this work, we analyze the effectiveness of different sets of well-known necessary N-representability conditions that are imposed on the variational determination of two-electron reduced density matrices corresponding to the ground and excited states of N-electron Hamiltonians within doubly occupied configuration interaction subspaces. The two-electron reduced density matrix elements are determined so that they are suitably related to those of higher-order reduced density matrices and other associated matrices, up to a given order, constituting positive semidefinite matrices. These conditions up to two-, three-, and four-order have been sequentially imposed on the variational calculation of the expectation values of the dispersion operator corresponding to several Hamiltonian models, obtaining the electronic spectra. These results have been contrasted with those arising from the full configuration interaction method, illuminating the sufficiency/insufficiency of the variational N-representability conditions applied.
This work proposes the variational determination of two-electron reduced density matrices corresponding to the ground state of N-electron systems within the doubly occupied-configuration-interaction methodology. The P, Q, and G two-index N-representability conditions have been extended to the T1 and T2 (T2') three-index ones and the resulting optimization problem has been addressed using a standard semidefinite program. We report results obtained from the doubly occupied-configuration-interaction method, from the two-index constraint variational procedure and from the two- and three-index constraint variational treatment. The discussion of these results along with a study of the computational cost demanded shows the usefulness of our proposal.
A many-body theory for interacting bosons is developed within the framework of minimizing the ground-state energy with respect to the two-particle reduced-density matrix (2-RDM) subject to NNN-representability conditions. The NNN-representability conditions, which ensure that the 2-RDM may be derived from an NNN-particle wave function, are imposed through a hierarchy of positivity conditions where the ppp-positivity conditions restrict the metric matrices for p∕2p∕2p∕2-body operators to be positive semidefinite. Using two-positivity, we minimize the ground-state energies of 5−−100005--10 0005−−10000 harmonically interacting bosons in a harmonic external potential. The energies and 2-RDMs obtained are in agreement with the exact solution except for round-off errors, which implies that for this class of boson interactions two-positivity conditions alone yield exact results for any interaction strength. The ground-state energies obtained at strong interactions are more accurate than many-body perturbative techniques by many orders of magnitude.
Abstract The variational determination of the two-fermion reduced density matrix (2-RDM) is described for harmonically trapped, ultracold few-fermion systems in one dimension with equal spin populations. This is accomplished by formulating the problem as a semi-definite program, with the 2-RDM being subject to well-knownN-representability conditions. The ground-state energies, as well as the density, pair-correlation function, and lower-order eigenvalues of the 2-RDM of various fermionic systems are found by utilising an augmented Lagrangian method for semi-definite programming. The ground-state energies are found to match well to those determined by full-configuration interaction and coupled-cluster calculations and the density, pair-correlation function, and eigenvalue results demonstrate that the salient features of these systems are well-described by this method. These results collectively demonstrate the utility of the reduced density matrix method firstly in describing strong correlation arising from short-range interactions, suggesting that the well-knownN-representability conditions are sufficient to model ultracold fermionic systems, and secondly in illustrating the prospect of treating larger systems currently out of the reach of established methods.
In this thesis the variational optimisation of the density matrix is discussed as a method in many-body quantum mechanics. This is a relatively unknown technique in which one tries to obtain the two-particle reduced density matrix directly in a variational approach. In the first Chapter we introduce the subject in the broader context of many-body quantum mechanics, and briefly sketch the history of the field. The second Chapter tries to summarise what is known about N-representability of reduced density matrices, and derives these results in a unified framework. The optimisation problem can be formulated as a semidefinite program. Three different algorithms are discussed in Chapter three, and their performance is compared. In Chapter four we show how symmetry can be exploited to reduce the computational cost considerably. Several applications of the method are discussed in Chapter five. We show that the standard two-index constraints fail in the strong-correlation limit of the one-dimensional Hubbard model. In Chapter six we identify the spin-adapted lifting conditions as the most compact constraints that can correctly describe this limit.