No Arabic abstract
A two-electron one-dimensional model of a heteroatomic molecule composed of two open-shell atoms is considered. Including only two electrons isolates and examines the effect that the highest occupied molecular orbital has on the Kohn-Sham potential as the molecule dissociates. We reproduce the characteristic step and peak that previous high-level wavefunction methods have shown to exist for real molecules in the low-density internuclear region. The simplicity of our model enables us to investigate in detail their development as a function of bond-length, with little computational effort, and derive properties of their features in the dissociation limit. We show that the onset of the step is coincident with the internuclear separation at which an avoided crossing between the ground-state and lowest charge-transfer excited state is approached. Although the step and peak features have little effect on the ground-state energetics, we discuss their important consequences for dynamics and response.
The accurate description of the optical spectra of insulators and semiconductors remains an important challenge for time-dependent density-functional theory (TDDFT). Evidence has been given in the literature that TDDFT can produce bound as well as continuum excitons for specific systems, but there are still many unresolved basic questions concerning the role of dynamical exchange and correlation (xc). In particular, the role of the long spatial range and the frequency dependence of the xc kernel $f_{rm xc}$ for excitonic binding are still not very well explored. We present a minimal model for excitons in TDDFT, consisting of two bands from a one-dimensional Kronig-Penney model and simple approximate xc kernels, which allows us to address these questions in a transparent manner. Depending on the system, it is found that adiabatic xc kernels can produce a single bound exciton, and sometimes two bound excitons, where the long spatial range of $f_{rm xc}$ is not a necessary condition. It is shown how the Wannier model, featuring an effective electron-hole interaction, emerges from TDDFT. The collective, many-body nature of excitons is explicitly demonstrated.
These lecture notes contain a brief practical introduction to doing density functional theory calculations for crystals using the open source Quantum Espresso software. The level is aimed at graduate students who are studying condensed matter or solid state physics, either theoretical or experimental.
The magnetic properties of the intermetallic compound FeAl are investigated using exact exchange density functional theory. This is implemented within a state of the art all-electron full potential method. We find that FeAl is magnetic with a moment of 0.70 $mu_B$, close to the LSDA result of 0.69 $mu_B$. A comparison with the non-magnetic density of states with experimental negative binding energy result shows a much better agreement than any previous calculations. We attribute this to the fine details of the exchange field, in particular its asymmetry, which is captured very well with the orbital dependent exchange potential.
Non-equilibrium Greens function techniques (NEGF) combined with Density Functional Theory (DFT) calculations have become a standard tool for the description of electron transport through single molecule nano-junctions in the coherent tunneling regime. However, the applicability of these methods for transport in the Coulomb blockade (CB) regime is still under debate. We present here NEGF-DFT calculations performed on simple model systems in the presence of an effective gate potential. The results show that: i) the CB addition energies can be predicted with such an approach with reasonable accuracy; ii) neither the magnitude of the Kohn-Sham gap nor the lack of a derivative discontinuity in the exchange-correlation functional represent a problem for this purpose.
We study the electronic structure and magnetism of 25% Mn substituted cubic Zirconia (ZrO2) with several homogeneous and heterogeneous doping profiles using density-functional theory calculations. We find that all doping profiles show half-metallic ferromagnetism (HMF), and delta-doping is most energy favorable while homogeneous doping has largest ferromagnetic stabilization energy. Using crystal field theory, we discuss the formation scheme of HMF. Finally, we speculate the potential spintronics applications for Mn doped ZrO2, especially as spin direction controllment.