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arXiv:cond-mat/0507183 · Physical Review A

Density-functional theory for fermions in the unitary regime

T. Papenbrock

Published Oct 11, 2005• 58 citations
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Abstract

In the unitary regime, fermions interact strongly via two-body potentials that exhibit a zero range and a (negative) infinite scattering length. The energy density is proportional to the energy density of the free Fermi gas with a proportionality constant $\ensuremath{\xi}$. The author uses a simple density functional parametrized by an effective mass and the universal constant $\ensuremath{\xi}$, and employs Kohn-Sham density-functional theory to obtain the parameters from fit to one exactly solvable two-body problem. This yields $\ensuremath{\xi}=0.42$ and a rather large effective mass. The form of the density functional is checked by similar Kohn-Sham calculations for the exactly solvable Calogero model.

DOI
10.1103/physreva.72.041603

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Spin 1/2 Fermions in the Unitary Limit.I

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This report concerns the energy of a zero-temperature many-body system of spin 1/2 fermions interacting via a two-body potential with a free space infinite scattering length and zero effective range; the Unitary limit. Given the corresponding phase-shift $δ(k)=π/2$ a one-term separable potential is obtained by inverse scattering assuming a momentum cut-off $Λ$ such that $δ(k)=0$ for $k>Λ$. The \it effective \rm interaction in the many-body system is calculated in a pp-ladder approximation with Pauli-blocking but neglecting mean-field (dispersion) corrections; effective mass $m^{*}=1$. Using only the zero relative momentum component of this interaction the total energy is $ξ=4/9$ (in units of the fermigas), a result reported by several previous authors. Integrating the momentum dependent interaction over the Fermi sea this energy is revised to $ξ=0.24.$ This result is independent of density and of the cut-off $Λ$ if $Λ> \sim 3k_{f}$. With $m^{*}\neq 1$ there is however a strong dependence on this cut-off. Including hh-ladders estimates give $ξ=0.4\leftrightarrow 0.6$, but a reliable result would in this case require a Green's function calculation.

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Spin 1/2 Fermions in the Unitary Limit

H. S. Køhler

The energy shift due to the interaction of two particles in a large box is proportional to the free particle scattering phase-shift. This provides an approximation to the effective interaction referred to as the phase-shift approximation. For a many-body fermion system this effective interaction has to be corrected for the Pauli-blocking. It is used to calculate the energy of a spin 1/2 fermion system as a function of the two-body scattering length and effective range. In the unitary limit with scattering length going to infinity and effective range going to zero the energy is 0.540 (in the units of the non-interactiong fermi gas energy) with a pp-ladder summation. Including hh-ladders the energy is 0.570. A smooth crossover from the BCS to the BEC region is observed. Pairing is not included.

arXiv:nucl-th/0701006•Jan 2, 2007•0 citations
In the unitary regime, fermions interact strongly via two-body potentials that exhibit a zero range and a (negative) infinite scattering length. The energy density is proportional to the energy density of the free Fermi gas with a proportionality constant \ensuremathξ\ensuremath{\xi}\ensuremathξ. The author uses a simple density functional parametrized by an effective mass and the universal constant \ensuremathξ\ensuremath{\xi}\ensuremathξ, and employs Kohn-Sham density-functional theory to obtain the parameters from fit to one exactly solvable two-body problem. This yields \ensuremathξ=0.42\ensuremath{\xi}=0.42\ensuremathξ=0.42 and a rather large effective mass. The form of the density functional is checked by similar Kohn-Sham calculations for the exactly solvable Calogero model.
This report concerns the energy of a zero-temperature many-body system of spin 1/2 fermions interacting via a two-body potential with a free space infinite scattering length and zero effective range; the Unitary limit. Given the corresponding phase-shift δ(k)=π/2δ(k)=π/2δ(k)=π/2 a one-term separable potential is obtained by inverse scattering assuming a momentum cut-off ΛΛΛ such that δ(k)=0δ(k)=0δ(k)=0 for k>Λk>Λk>Λ. The \it effective \rm interaction in the many-body system is calculated in a pp-ladder approximation with Pauli-blocking but neglecting mean-field (dispersion) corrections; effective mass m∗=1m^{*}=1m∗=1. Using only the zero relative momentum component of this interaction the total energy is ξ=4/9ξ=4/9ξ=4/9 (in units of the fermigas), a result reported by several previous authors. Integrating the momentum dependent interaction over the Fermi sea this energy is revised to ξ=0.24.ξ=0.24.ξ=0.24. This result is independent of density and of the cut-off ΛΛΛ if Λ>∼3kfΛ> \sim 3k_{f}Λ>∼3kf​. With m∗≠1m^{*}\neq 1m∗=1 there is however a strong dependence on this cut-off. Including hh-ladders estimates give ξ=0.4↔0.6ξ=0.4\leftrightarrow 0.6ξ=0.4↔0.6, but a reliable result would in this case require a Green's function calculation.
A density-functional theory is proposed for strongly interacting fermions with arbitrary large negative scattering length. The functional has only two parameters that are directly fixed to reproduce the universal properties of unitary gas: the so-called Bertsch parameter ${\ensuremath{\xi}}_{0}$ and a parameter ${\ensuremath{\eta}}_{e}$ related to the possible influence of the effective range re{r}_{e}re​ at infinite scattering length aaa. Using most recent quantum Monte Carlo (QMC) estimates of these two parameters, it is shown that the functional properly reproduces the experimental measurements of interacting Fermi systems not only at unitarity but also away from this limit over a wide range of ${(a{k}_{F})}^{\ensuremath{-}1}$ values. The functional is applied to obtain an expression of Tan's contact parameter including the effect of re{r}_{e}re​. Application is finally made to neutron matter. It is shown that most recent QMC results are well reproduced.
We consider interacting Fermi systems close to the unitary regime and compute the corrections to the energy density that are due to a large scattering length and a small effective range. Our approach exploits the universality of the density functional and determines the corrections from the analyical results for the harmonically trapped two-body system. The corrections due to the finite scattering length compare well with the result of Monte Carlo simulations. We also apply our results to symmetric neutron matter.
We present an alternative to the Kohn-Sham formulation of density-functional theory for the ground-state properties of strongly interacting electronic systems. The idea is to start from the limit of zero kinetic energy and systematically expand the universal energy functional of the density in powers of a "coupling constant" that controls the magnitude of the kinetic energy. The problem of minimizing the energy is reduced to the solution of a strictly correlated electron problem in the presence of an effective potential, which in our theory plays the same role as the Kohn-Sham potential plays in the traditional formulation. We discuss several schemes for approximating the energy functional, and report preliminary results for low-density quantum dots.
We further progress along the line of Ref. [D. Lacroix, Phys. Rev. A 94, 043614 (2016)] where a functional for Fermi systems with anomalously large sss-wave scattering length as{a}_{s}as​ was proposed that has no free parameters. The functional is designed to correctly reproduce the unitary limit in Fermi gases together with the leading-order contributions in the sss- and ppp-wave channels at low density. The functional is shown to be predictive up to densities $\ensuremath{\sim}0.01 {\mathrm{fm}}^{\ensuremath{-}3}$ that is much higher densities compared to the Lee-Yang functional, valid for $\ensuremath{\rho}<{10}^{\ensuremath{-}6} {\mathrm{fm}}^{\ensuremath{-}3}$. The form of the functional retained in this work is further motivated. It is shown that the new functional corresponds to an expansion of the energy in (askF)({a}_{s}{k}_{F})(as​kF​) and (rekF)({r}_{e}{k}_{F})(re​kF​) to all orders, where re{r}_{e}re​ is the effective range and kF{k}_{F}kF​ is the Fermi momentum. One conclusion from the present work is that, except in the extremely low-density regime, nuclear systems can be treated perturbatively in $\ensuremath{-}{({a}_{s}{k}_{F})}^{\ensuremath{-}1}$ with respect to the unitary limit. Starting from the functional, we introduce density-dependent scales and show that scales associated with the bare interaction are strongly renormalized by medium effects. As a consequence, some of the scales at play around saturation are dominated by the unitary gas properties and not directly by low-energy constants. For instance, we show that the scale in the sss-wave channel around saturation is proportional to the so-called Bertsch parameter ${\ensuremath{\xi}}_{0}$ and becomes independent of as{a}_{s}as​. We also point out that these scales are of the same order of magnitude than those empirically obtained in the Skyrme energy density functional. We finally propose a slight modification of the functional such that it becomes accurate up to the saturation density $\ensuremath{\rho}\ensuremath{\simeq}0.16 {\mathrm{fm}}^{\ensuremath{-}3}$.
The energy shift due to the interaction of two particles in a large box is proportional to the free particle scattering phase-shift. This provides an approximation to the effective interaction referred to as the phase-shift approximation. For a many-body fermion system this effective interaction has to be corrected for the Pauli-blocking. It is used to calculate the energy of a spin 1/2 fermion system as a function of the two-body scattering length and effective range. In the unitary limit with scattering length going to infinity and effective range going to zero the energy is 0.540 (in the units of the non-interactiong fermi gas energy) with a pp-ladder summation. Including hh-ladders the energy is 0.570. A smooth crossover from the BCS to the BEC region is observed. Pairing is not included.