Eigenfunctions description

In practice, each CSF is a Slater determinant of molecular orbitals, which are divided into three types inactive (doubly occupied), virtual (unoccupied), and active (variable occupancy). The active orbitals are used to build up the various CSFs, and so introduce flexibility into the wave function by including configurations that can describe different situations. Approximate electronic-state wave functions are then provided by the eigenfunctions of the electronic Flamiltonian in the CSF basis. This contrasts to standard FIF theory in which only a single determinant is used, without active orbitals. The use of CSFs, gives the MCSCF wave function a structure that can be interpreted using chemical pictures of electronic configurations [229]. An interpretation in terms of valence bond sti uctures has also been developed, which is very useful for description of a chemical process (see the appendix in [230] and references cited therein). 

The spin in quantum mechanics was introduced because experiments indicated that individual particles are not completely identified in terms of their three spatial coordinates [87]. Here we encounter, to some extent, a similar situation A system of items (i.e., distributions of electrons) in a given point in configuration space is usually described in terms of its set of eigenfunctions. This description is incomplete because the existence of conical intersections causes the electronic manifold to be multivalued. For example, in case of two (isolated) conical intersections we may encounter at a given point m configuration space four different sets of eigenfunctions (see Section Vni). 

PES), which is different for each electronic state of the system (i.e. each eigenfunction of the BO Schrodinger equation). Based on these PESs, the nuclear Schrodinger equation is solved to define, for example, the possible nuclear vibrational levels. This approach will be used below in the description of the nuclear inelastic scattering (NIS) method. 

For the constmction of spin eigenfunctions see, for example. Ref. [36]. The spin-coupled wavefunction may be extended by adding further configurations, in which case we may speak of a multiconfigurational spin-coupled (MCSC) description. In the... 

In conventional quantum mechanics, a wavefunction d ribing the ground or excited states of a many-particle system must be a simultaneous eigenfunction of the set of operators that commute with the Hamiltonian. Thus, for example, for an adequate description of an atom, one must introduce the angular momentum and spin operators L, S, L, and the parity operator H, in addition to the Hamiltonian operator. 

The description we give of the Bom-Oppenheimer approximation is roughly that followed by Bom uni Huang (10) and others. As a basis to the eigenfunctions of the full molecular Hamiltonian (2) we take a set of functions )... 

Slater s bond eigenfunctions constitute one choice (out of an infinite number) of a particular sort of basis function to use in the evaluation of the Hamiltonian and overlap matrix elements. They have come to be called the Heitler-London-Slater-Pauling (HLSP) functions. Physically, they treat each chemical bond as a singlet-coupled pair of electrons. This is the natural extension of the original Heitler-London approach. In addition to Slater, Pauling[12] and Eyring and Kimbal[13] have contributed to the method. Our following description does not follow exactly the discussions of the early workers, but the final results are the same. 

Each spin orbital is a product of a space function fa and a spin function a. or ft. In the closed-shell case the space function or molecular orbitals each appear twice, combined first with the a. spin function and then with the y spin function. For open-shell cases two approaches are possible. In the restricted Hartree-Fock (RHF) approach, as many electrons as possible are placed in molecular orbitals in the same fashion as in the closed-shell case and the remainder are associated with different molecular orbitals. We thus have both doubly occupied and singly occupied orbitals. The alternative approach, the unrestricted Hartree-Fock (UHF) method, uses different sets of molecular orbitals to combine with a and ft spin functions. The UHF function gives a better description of the wavefunction but is not an eigenfunction of the spin operator S.2 The three cases are illustrated by the examples below. 

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