Second order perturbation theory correlation effects

Perturbative methods (CASPT2 [17], NEVPT2 [18]) add the dynamical correlation in an effective way, using multiconfigurational second-order perturbation theory on the CASSCF input states. These methods have proved to be suitable for studying problems in spectroscopy, photochemistry, and so on [19, 20]. 

Btiilding on atomic studies using even-tempered basis sets, universal basis sets and systematic sequences of even-tempered basis sets, recent work has shown that molecular basis sets can be systematically developed until the error associated with basis set truncation is less that some required tolerance. The approach has been applied first to diatomic molecules within the Hartree-Fock formalism[12] [13] [14] [15] [16] [17] where finite difference[18] [19] [20] [21] and finite element[22] [23] [24] [25] calculations provide benchmarks against which the results of finite basis set studies can be measured and then to polyatomic molecules and in calculations which take account of electron correlation effects by means of second order perturbation theory. The basis sets employed in these calculations are even-tempered and distributed, that is they contain functions centred not only on the atomic nuclei but also on the midpoints of the line segments between these nuclei and at other points. Functions centred on the bond centres were found to be very effective in approaching the Hartree-Fock limit but somewhat less effective in recovering correlation effects. 

In this paper, the main features of the two-step method are presented and PNC calculations are discussed, both those without accounting for correlation effects (PbF and HgF) and those in which electron correlations are taken into account by a combined method of the second-order perturbation theory (PT2) and configuration interaction (Cl), or PT2/CI [100] (for BaF and YbF), by the relativistic coupled cluster (RCC) method [101, 102] (for TIF, PbO, and HI+), and by the spin-orbit direct-CI method [103, 104, 105] (for PbO). In the ab initio calculations discussed here, the best accuracy of any current method has been attained for the hyperfine constants and P,T-odd parameters regarding the molecules containing heavy atoms. 

We shall compare the potential curves obtained with the two different methods. Second order perturbation theory (CASPT2) has been used to estimate the remaining correlation effects in the FCI calculation with the smaller number of orbitals. This approach will be described in detail below. The spectroscopic constants are presented in Table 5-2. As can be seen, the two results are almost identical. The results are obviously far from experiment because of the small basis set used but that is not relevant to the present discussion. With the smaller number of orbitals we can now perform much more advanced calculations using larger basis sets and approach the experimental values. As an illustration, such a result is also given in the table. 

We have above discussed the CASSCF method and how we can choose the active space. We noted that this choice was closely connected to the method we use to compute the effects of dynamic correlation, in this case the CASPT2 method. The development of this approach was inspired by the success of the Mpller-Plesset second order perturbation theory (MP2), which has been used for a long time to treat electron correlation for ground states, where the reference function is a single determinant. It was assumed that such an approach would be even more effective with the more accurate CASSCF reference function. A first attempt was made soon... 

An important defect of all the single electron calculations is the neglect of electron correlation. Various methods have been employed to rectify this problem. Its inclusion using second order perturbation theory has been found to provide much better agreement between theory and experiment in some instances. The inclusion of electron correlation has a profound effect since the electrons and holes in the first excited state are bound by their Coulomb interaction to form a localised state, an exciton. This state is separated from the conduction band by the exciton binding energy. That this model... 

The correlation effects are all included in AV, the difference between the correct Hamiltonian and the VSCF one. Assuming the term is sufficiently small, we apply second order perturbation theory and find ... 

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