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At least 181 records · Page 10
All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
DOE OSTI2023

The General Atomic and Molecular Electronic Structure System (GAMESS): Novel Methods on Novel Architectures

The primary focus of GAMESS over the last 5 years has been the development of new high-performance codes that are able to take effective and efficient advantage of the most advanced computer architectures, both CPU and accelerators. These efforts include employing density fitting and fragmentation methods to reduce the high scaling of well-correlated (e.g., coupled-cluster) methods as well as developing novel codes that can take optimal advantage of graphical processing units and other modern accelerators. Because accurate wave functions can be very complex, an important new functionality in GAMESS is the quasi-atomic orbital analysis, an unbiased approach to the understanding of covalent bonds embedded in the wave function. Finally, best practices for the maintenance and distribution of GAMESS are also discussed.

37 INORGANIC, ORGANIC, PHYSICAL, AND ANALYTICAL CH↗
DOE OSTI2026

Symmetry dilemmas in quantum computing for chemistry: A comprehensive analysis

Symmetry adaptation, universality, and gate efficiency are central but often competing requirements in quantum algorithms for electronic structure and many-body physics. For example, fully symmetry-adapted universal operator pools typically generate long and deep quantum circuits; gate-efficient universal operator pools generally break symmetries; and gate-efficient, fully symmetry-adapted operator pools may not be universal. In this work, we analyze such symmetry dilemmas both theoretically and numerically. On the theory side, we prove that the popular, gate-efficient operator pool consisting of singlet spin-adapted singles and perfect-pairing doubles is not universal when spatial symmetry is enforced. To demonstrate the strengths and weaknesses of the three types of pools, we perform numerical simulations using an adaptive algorithm paired with operator pools that are (i) fully symmetry-adapted and universal, (ii) fully symmetry-adapted and non-universal, and (iii) breaking a single symmetry and universal. Our numerical simulations encompass three physically relevant scenarios in which the target state is (i) the global ground state, (ii) the ground state crossed by a state differing in multiple symmetry properties, and (iii) the ground state crossed by a state differing in a single symmetry property. Our results show when symmetry-breaking but universal pools can be used safely, when enforcing at least one distinguishing symmetry suffices, and when a particular symmetry must be rigorously preserved to avoid variational collapse. Together, the formal and numerical analyses provide a practical guide for designing and benchmarking symmetry-adapted operator pools that balance universality, resource requirements, and robust state targeting in quantum simulations for chemistry.

37 INORGANIC, ORGANIC, PHYSICAL, AND ANALYTICAL CH↗
DOE OSTI2026

The high-valent vanadium chemistry of isoindoline chelates

Isoindoline-based chelates, in particular bis(arylimino)isoindolines, have shown extensive metal binding chemistry. Although this chemistry has been explored for the middle and late transition metal ions, little work has been carried out on early transition metal complexes. In this article, we present the first examples of vanadium coordinated using four bis(arylimino)isoindolines, in which the aryl groups are pyrazole, indazole, benzimidazole, and pyridine (ligands 1–4 , respectively). We isolated five complexes using vanadyl sulfate or vanadyl acetylacetonate as the vanadium source. In all cases, the ligands bound in a meridional mode, and for four of the complexes, the vanadium ion was observed in the V(v) oxidation state. Three of the ligands ( 1–3 ) formed VO 2 complexes with vanadyl sulfate and vanadyl acetylacetonate, but the bis(pyridylimino)isoindoline (ligand 4 ) formed a V(v) oxosulfonato complex with the former starting material and a vanadyl V(iv) acetylacetonate with the latter starting material. All metal compounds were structurally elucidated by X-ray crystallographic methods, and we probed their electronic structures using DFT methods.

Bore, Joan C. [Univ. of Akron, OH (United States)]↗
NASA NTRS1998

Comparison of Conjugate Gradient Density Matrix Search and Chebyshev Expansion Methods for Avoiding Diagonalization in Large-Scale Electronic Structure Calculations

We report a comparison of two linear-scaling methods which avoid the diagonalization bottleneck of traditional electronic structure algorithms. The Chebyshev expansion method (CEM) is implemented for carbon tight-binding calculations of large systems and its memory and timing requirements compared to those of our previously implemented conjugate gradient density matrix search (CG-DMS). Benchmark calculations are carried out on icosahedral fullerenes from C60 to C8640 and the linear scaling memory and CPU requirements of the CEM demonstrated. We show that the CPU requisites of the CEM and CG-DMS are similar for calculations with comparable accuracy.

Bates, Kevin R.↗
DOE OSTI2022

Surrogate Hessian accelerated structural optimization for stochastic electronic structure theories

In this work, we present an efficient energy-based method for structural optimization with stochastic electronic structure theories, such as diffusion quantum Monte Carlo (DMC). This method is based on robust line-search energy minimization in reduced parameter space, exploiting approximate but accurate Hessian information from a surrogate theory, such as density functional theory. The surrogate theory is also used to characterize the potential energy surface, allowing for simple but reliable ways to maximize statistical efficiency while retaining controllable accuracy. We demonstrate the method by finding the minimum DMC energy structures of the selected flake-like aromatic molecules, such as benzene, coronene, and ovalene, represented by 2, 6, and 19 structural parameters, respectively. In each case, the energy minimum is found within two parallel line-search iterations. The method is near-optimal for a line-search technique and suitable for a broad range of applications. It is easily generalized to any electronic structure method where forces and stresses are still under active development and implementation, such as diffusion Monte Carlo, auxiliary-field Monte Carlo, and stochastic configuration interaction, as well as deterministic approaches such as the random-phase approximation. Accurate and efficient means of geometry optimization could shed light on a broad class of materials and molecules, showing high sensitivity of induced properties to structural variables.

37 INORGANIC, ORGANIC, PHYSICAL, AND ANALYTICAL CH↗
DOE OSTI2021

CTRAMER: An open-source software package for correlating interfacial charge transfer rate constants with donor/acceptor geometries in organic photovoltaic materials

In this paper, we present CTRAMER (Charge-Transfer RAtes from Molecular dynamics, Electronic structure, and Rate theory)—an opensource software package for calculating interfacial charge-transfer (CT) rate constants in organic photovoltaic (OPV) materials based on ab initio calculations and molecular dynamics simulations. The software is based on identifying representative donor/acceptor geometries within interfacial structures obtained from molecular dynamics simulation of donor/acceptor blends and calculating the corresponding Fermi’s golden rule CT rate constants within the framework of the linearized-semiclassical approximation. While the methods used are well established, the integration of these state-of-the-art tools originating from different disciplines to study photoinduced CT processes with explicit treatment of the environment, in our opinion, makes this package unique and innovative. The software also provides tools for investigating other observables of interest. After outlining the features and implementation details, the usage and performance of the software are demonstrated with results from an example OPV system.

37 INORGANIC, ORGANIC, PHYSICAL, AND ANALYTICAL CH↗
DOE OSTI2025

Impact of solvation on the electronic resonances in uracil

Interactions of low-energy electrons with the DNA and RNA nucleobases are known to form metastable states, known as electronic resonances. In this work, we study electron attachment to solvated uracil, an RNA nucleobase, using the orbital stabilization method at the Equation of Motion-Coupled Cluster for Electron Affinities with Singles and Doubles (EOM-EA-CCSD) level of theory with the Effective Fragment Potential (EFP) solvation method. We benchmarked the approach using multireference methods, as well as by comparing EFP and full quantum calculations. The impact of solvation on the first one particle (1p) shape resonance, formed by electron attachment to the π* LUMO orbital, as well as the first two particle one hole (2p1h) resonance, formed by electron attachment to neutral uracil's π–π* excited state, was investigated. We used molecular dynamics simulations for solvent configurations and applied charge stabilization technique-based biased sampling to procure configurations adequate to cover the entire range of the electron attachment energy distribution. The electron attachment energy in solution is found to be distributed over a wide range of energies, between 4.6 eV to 6.8 eV for the 2p1h resonance, and between −0.1 eV to 2 eV for the 1p resonance. The solvent effects were similar for the two resonances, indicating that the exact electron density of the state is not as important as the solvent configurations. Multireference calculations extended the findings showing that solvation effects are similar for the lowest four resonances, further indicating that the specific solute electron density is not as important, but rather the water configurations play the most important role in solvation effects. Lastly, by comparing bulk solvation to clusters of uracil with a few water molecules around it, we find that the impact of microsolvation is very different from that of bulk solvation.

37 INORGANIC, ORGANIC, PHYSICAL, AND ANALYTICAL CH↗
DOE OSTI2022

Assessing MP2 frozen natural orbitals in relativistic correlated electronic structure calculations

The high computational scaling with the basis set size and the number of correlated electrons is a bottleneck limiting applications of coupled cluster algorithms, in particular for calculations based on two- or four-component relativistic Hamiltonians, which often employ uncontracted basis sets. This problem may be alleviated by replacing canonical Hartree–Fock virtual orbitals by natural orbitals (NOs). Here, in this paper, we describe the implementation of a module for generating NOs for correlated wavefunctions and, in particular, second order Møller–Plesset perturbation frozen natural orbitals (MP2FNOs) as a component of our novel implementation of relativistic coupled cluster theory for massively parallel architectures [Pototschnig et al. J. Chem. Theory Comput. 17, 5509, (2021)]. Our implementation can manipulate complex or quaternion density matrices, thus allowing for the generation of both Kramers-restricted and Kramers-unrestricted MP2FNOs. Furthermore, NOs are re-expressed in the parent atomic orbital (AO) basis, allowing for generating coupled cluster singles and doubles NOs in the AO basis for further analysis. By investigating the truncation errors of MP2FNOs for both the correlation energy and molecular properties—electric field gradients at the nuclei, electric dipole and quadrupole moments for hydrogen halides HX (X = F–Ts), and parity-violating energy differences for H 2 Z 2 (Z = O–Se)—we find MP2FNOs accelerate the convergence of the correlation energy in a roughly uniform manner across the Periodic Table. It is possible to obtain reliable estimates for both energies and the molecular properties considered with virtual molecular orbital spaces truncated to about half the size of the full spaces.

37 INORGANIC, ORGANIC, PHYSICAL, AND ANALYTICAL CH↗
DOE OSTI2022

Fully self-consistent finite-temperature $GW$ in Gaussian Bloch orbitals for solids

In this work, we present algorithmic and implementation details for the fully self-consistent finite-temperature $GW$ method in Gaussian Bloch orbitals for solids. Our implementation is based on the finite-temperature Green's function formalism in which all equations are solved on the imaginary axis, without resorting to analytical continuation during the self-consistency. No quasiparticle approximation is employed and all matrix elements of the self-energy are explicitly evaluated. The method is tested by evaluating the band gaps of selected semiconductors and insulators. We show agreement with other, differently formulated, finite-temperature sc ⁢$GW$ implementations when finite-size corrections and basis-set errors are taken into account. By migrating computationally intensive calculations to graphics processing units, we obtain scalable results on large supercomputers with nearly optimal performance. Our work demonstrates the applicability of Gaussian orbital based sc⁢ $GW$ for ab initio correlated material simulations and provides a sound starting point for embedding methods built on top of $GW$.

75 CONDENSED MATTER PHYSICS, SUPERCONDUCTIVITY AND↗
DOE OSTI2022

Piecewise interaction picture density matrix quantum Monte Carlo

The density matrix quantum Monte Carlo (DMQMC) set of methods stochastically samples the exact N-body density matrix for interacting electrons at finite temperature. We introduce a simple modification to the interaction picture DMQMC (IP-DMQMC) method that overcomes the limitation of only sampling one inverse temperature point at a time, instead allowing for the sampling of a temperature range within a single calculation, thereby reducing the computational cost. At the target inverse temperature, instead of ending the simulation, we incorporate a change of picture away from the interaction picture. The resulting equations of motion have piecewise functions and use the interaction picture in the first phase of a simulation, followed by the application of the Bloch equation once the target inverse temperature is reached. We find that the performance of this method is similar to or better than the DMQMC and IP-DMQMC algorithms in a variety of molecular test systems.

37 INORGANIC, ORGANIC, PHYSICAL, AND ANALYTICAL CH↗
DOE OSTI2023

Thermofield Theory for Finite-Temperature Electronic Structure

Wave function methods have offered a robust, systematically improvable means to study ground-state properties in quantum many-body systems. Theories like coupled cluster and their derivatives provide highly accurate approximations to the energy landscape at a reasonable computational cost. Analogues of such methods to study thermal properties, though highly desirable, have been lacking because evaluating thermal properties involve a trace over the entire Hilbert space, which is a formidable task. Besides, excited-state theories are generally not as well studied as ground-state ones. In this mini-review, we present an overview of a finite-temperature wave function formalism based on thermofield dynamics to overcome these difficulties. Thermofield dynamics allows us to map the equilibrium thermal density matrix to a pure state, i.e., a single wave function, albeit in an expanded Hilbert space. Ensemble averages become expectation values over this so-called thermal state. Around this thermal state, we have developed a procedure to generalize ground-state wave function theories to finite temperatures. As explicit examples, we highlight formulations of mean-field, configuration interaction, and coupled cluster theories for thermal properties of Fermions in the grand-canonical ensemble. To assess the quality of these approximations, we also show benchmark studies for the one-dimensional Hubbard model, while comparing against exact results. We will see that the thermal methods perform similarly to their ground-state counterparts, while merely adding a prefactor to the asymptotic computational cost. Furthermore, they also inherit all the properties, good or bad, from the ground-state methods, signifying the robustness of our formalism and the scope for future development.

37 INORGANIC, ORGANIC, PHYSICAL, AND ANALYTICAL CH↗
DOE OSTI2025

Linear-scaling quadruple excitations in local pair natural orbital coupled-cluster theory

Here, we present a fast, asymptotically linear-scaling implementation of the perturbative quadruples energy correction in coupled-cluster theory using local natural orbitals. Our work follows the domain-based local pair natural orbital (DLPNO) approach previously applied to lower levels of excitations in coupled-cluster theory. Our DLPNO-CCSDT(Q) algorithm uses converged doubles and triples amplitudes from a preceding DLPNO-CCSDT computation to compute the quadruples amplitude and energy in the quadruples natural orbital (QNO) basis. We demonstrate the compactness of the QNO space, showing that more than 95% of the (Q) correction can be recovered using relatively loose natural orbital cutoffs, compared to the tighter cutoffs used in pair and triples natural orbitals at lower levels of coupled-cluster theory. We also highlight the accuracy of our algorithm in the computation of relative energies, which yields deviations of sub-kJ mol −1 in relative energy compared to the canonical CCSDT(Q). Timings are conducted on a series of growing linear alkanes (up to 10 carbons and 608 basis functions) and water clusters (up to 49 water molecules and 2842 basis functions) to establish the asymptotic linear-scaling of our DLPNO-(Q) algorithm.

Auxiliary functions↗
DOE OSTI2021

The FMO-DFTB Method

Although the fragment molecular orbital (FMO) method enables electronic structure calculations with near-linear scaling behavior with respect to system size, the computational cost of ab initio methods typically employed in conjunction with FMO is still prohibitive for routine calculations of very large systems or long timescale molecular dynamics simulations. We, therefore, combined the FMO and density-functional tight-binding (DFTB) method, which is one of the emerging semi-empirical quantum chemical methods, and have demonstrated that FMO-DFTB is capable of performing geometry optimizations for systems containing up to one million atoms using limited computational resources. In this chapter, we will review the basics of the DFTB method first before introducing FMO-DFTB, focusing on the relationship with density functional theory and other FMO methodologies. We also demonstrate the latest scalings of FMO-DFTB2 and DFTB3 using three-dimensional water clusters, showing that the most favorable scaling is O(N1.16). Applications of FMO-DFTB to various systems are briefly summarized, and an outlook to future applications is provided.

Nishimoto, Yoshio↗
DOE OSTI2021

Ab initio molecular dynamics on quantum computers

Ab initio molecular dynamics (AIMD) is a valuable technique for studying molecules and materials at finite temperatures where the nuclei evolve on potential energy surfaces obtained from accurate electronic structure calculations. In this work, we present an approach to running AIMD simulations on noisy intermediate-scale quantum (NISQ)-era quantum computers. The electronic energies are calculated on a quantum computer using the variational quantum eigensolver (VQE) method. Algorithms for computation of analytical gradients entirely on a quantum computer require quantum fault-tolerant hardware, which is beyond NISQ-era. Therefore, we compute the energy gradients numerically using finite differences, the Hellmann-Feynman theorem, and a correlated sampling technique. This method only requires additional classical calculations of electron integrals for each degree of freedom without any additional computations on a quantum computer beyond the initial VQE run. As a proof of concept, AIMD simulations are demonstrated for the H-2 molecule on IBM quantum devices. In addition, we demonstrate the validity of the method for larger molecules using full configuration interaction wave functions. As quantum hardware and noise mitigation techniques continue to improve, the method can be utilized for studying larger molecular systems.

37 INORGANIC, ORGANIC, PHYSICAL, AND ANALYTICAL CH↗
DOE OSTI2020

Beyond the electric-dipole approximation in simulations of x-ray absorption spectroscopy: Lessons from relativistic theory

Herein we present three schemes to go beyond the electric-dipole approximation in x-ray absorption spectroscopy calculations within a four-component relativistic framework. The first is based on the full semi-classical light–matter interaction operator and the two others on a truncated interaction within the Coulomb gauge (velocity representation) and multipolar gauge (length representation). We generalize the derivation of the multipolar gauge to an arbitrary expansion point and show that the potentials corresponding to different expansion points are related by a gauge transformation, provided that the expansion is not truncated. This suggests that the observed gauge-origin dependence in the multipolar gauge is more than just a finite-basis set effect. The simplicity of the relativistic formalism enables arbitrary-order implementations of the truncated interactions, with and without rotational averaging, allowing us to test their convergence behavior numerically by comparison to the full formulation. We confirm the observation that the oscillator strength of the electric-dipole allowed ligand K -edge transition of TiCl 4 , when calculated to the second order in the wave vector, becomes negative but also show that inclusion of higher-order contributions allows convergence to the result obtained using the full light–matter interaction. However, at higher energies, the slow convergence of such expansions becomes dramatic and renders such approaches at best impractical. When going beyond the electric-dipole approximation, we therefore recommend the use of the full light–matter interaction.

37 INORGANIC, ORGANIC, PHYSICAL, AND ANALYTICAL CH↗
NASA NTRS1988

Scanning tunneling microscopy characterization of the geometric and electronic structure of hydrogen-terminated silicon surfaces

Scanning tunneling microscopy (STM) methods are used to characterize hydrogen-terminated Si surfaces prepared by a novel method. The surface preparation method is used to expose the Si-SiO2 interface. STM images directly reveal the topographic structure of the Si-SiO2 interface. The dependence of interface topography on oxide preparation conditions observed by STM is compared to the results of conventional surface characterization methods. Also, the electronic structure of the hydrogen-terminated surface is studied by STM spectroscopy. The near-ideal electronic structure of this surface enables direct tunnel spectroscopy measurements of Schottky barrier phenomena. In addition, this method enables probing of semiconductor subsurface properties by STM.

Kaiser, W. J.↗
DOE OSTI2025

Calculation of ion–ion mutual neutralization rate constants using Landau–Zener theory coupled with trajectory simulations for Ar + –Cl − , Br − , I −

In this computational study, we self-consistently calculate the rate constants of mutual neutralization reactions by incorporating the electron transfer probability, using Landau–Zener state transition theory with inputs derived from ab initio quantum chemistry calculations, into classical trajectory simulations. Electronic structure calculations are done using correlation consistent basis sets with multi-reference configuration interaction to map all the molecular electronic states below the ion-dissociation limit as a function of the distance between the reacting species. Our electronic structure calculations have been significantly improved from our previous work through improved selection of molecular electronic configurations maintaining a fine grid of 1a 0 over a wide range of bond lengths and accurate treatment of spin–orbit couplings. Non-adiabatic coupling matrix elements are calculated with the three-point central difference method near each avoided crossing to estimate the exact crossing point R x and coupling parameter H if , which are inputs to the multi-channel Landau–Zener theory to calculate the electron transition probability. Our approach is applied to estimate the mutual neutralization rate constants for the following ion pairs: Ar + –Cl − , Ar + –Br − , Ar + –I − at ∼133 Pa. Furthermore, our predictions are compared against the experimental data reported. It is seen that the improvement in the electronic structure calculation results in excellent agreement between the simulation results and the available experimental data to within a factor of ∼2 or ∼±50%.

Complete-active space self-consistent field↗