How large are nonadiabatic effects in atomic and diatomic systems?

Extension of the D3 and D4 London dispersion corrections to the full actinides series

Efficient dispersion corrections are an indispensable component of modern density functional theory, semi-empirical quantum mechanical, and even force field methods. In this work, we extend the well established D3 and D4 London dispersion corrections to the full actinides series, francium, and radium. To keep consistency with the existing versions, the original parameterization strategy of the D4 model was only slightly modified. This includes improved reference Hirshfeld atomic partial charges at the ωB97M-V/ma-def-TZVP level to fit the required electronegativity equilibration charge (EEQ) model. In this context, we developed a new actinide data set called AcQM, which covers the most common molecular actinide compound space. Furthermore, the efficient calculation of dynamic polarizabilities that are needed to construct CAB6 dispersion coefficients was implemented into the ORCA program package. The extended models are assessed for the computation of dissociation curves of actinide atoms and ions, geometry optimizations of crystal structure cutouts, gas-phase structures of small uranium compounds, and an example extracted from a small actinide complex protein assembly. We found that the novel parameterizations perform on par with the computationally more demanding density-dependent VV10 dispersion correction. With the presented extension, the excellent cost-accuracy ratio of the D3 and D4 models can now be utilized in various fields of computational actinide chemistry and, e.g., in efficient composite DFT methods such as r2SCAN-3c. They are implemented in our freely available standalone codes (dftd4, s-dftd3) and the D4 version will be also available in the upcoming ORCA 6.0 program package.

Nucleus-electron correlation revising molecular bonding fingerprints from the exact wavefunction factorization

We present a novel theory and implementation for computing coupled electronic and quantal nuclear subsystems on a single potential energy surface, moving beyond the standard Born-Oppenheimer (BO) separation of nuclei and electrons. We formulate an exact self-consistent nucleus-electron embedding potential from the single product molecular wavefunction and demonstrate that the fundamental behavior of the correlated nucleus-electron can be computed for mean-field electrons that are responsive to a quantal anharmonic vibration of selected nuclei in a discrete variable representation. Geometric gauge choices are discussed and necessary for formulating energy invariant biorthogonal electronic equations. Our method is further applied to characterize vibrationally averaged molecular bonding properties of molecular energetics, bond lengths, and protonic and electron densities. Moreover, post-Hartree-Fock electron correlation can be conveniently computed on the basis of nucleus-electron coupled molecular orbitals, as demonstrated for correlated models of second-order Møllet-Plesset perturbation and full configuration interaction theories. Our approach not only accurately quantifies non-classical nucleus-electron couplings for revising molecular bonding properties but also provides an alternative time-independent approach for deploying non-BO molecular quantum chemistry.

QMCPACK: an open source ab initio quantum Monte Carlo package for the electronic structure of atoms, molecules and solids

QMCPACK is an open source quantum Monte Carlo package for ab initio electronic structure calculations. It supports calculations of metallic and insulating solids, molecules, atoms, and some model Hamiltonians. Implemented real space quantum Monte Carlo algorithms include variational, diffusion, and reptation Monte Carlo. QMCPACK uses Slater-Jastrow type trial wavefunctions in conjunction with a sophisticated optimizer capable of optimizing tens of thousands of parameters. The orbital space auxiliary-field quantum Monte Carlo method is also implemented, enabling cross validation between different highly accurate methods. The code is specifically optimized for calculations with large numbers of electrons on the latest high performance computing architectures, including multicore central processing unit and graphical processing unit systems. We detail the program's capabilities, outline its structure, and give examples of its use in current research calculations. The package is available at http://qmcpack.org.