QWalk: A quantum Monte Carlo program for electronic structure (original) (raw)
Related papers
Journal of physics. Condensed matter : an Institute of Physics journal, 2018
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 wave functions 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 (CPU) and graphical processing unit (GPU) systems. We detail the program's capabilities, outline its structure, and give examples of its use in current research calculations. The p...
Fast and accurate quantum Monte Carlo for molecular crystals
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 2018
Significance Computational approaches based on the fundamental laws of quantum mechanics are now integral to almost all materials design initiatives in academia and industry. If computational materials science is genuinely going to deliver on its promises, then an electronic structure method with consistently high accuracy is urgently needed. We show that, thanks to recent algorithmic advances and the strategy developed in our manuscript, quantum Monte Carlo yields extremely accurate predictions for the lattice energies of materials at a surprisingly modest computational cost. It is thus no longer a technique that requires a world-leading computational facility to obtain meaningful results. While we focus on molecular crystals, the significance of our findings extends to all classes of materials.
Zori 1.0: A parallel quantum Monte Carlo electronic structure package
Journal of Computational Chemistry, 2005
The Zori 1.0 package for electronic structure computations is described. Zori performs variational and diffusion Monte Carlo computations as well as correlated wave function optimization. This article presents an overview of the implemented methods and code capabilities.
Electronic structure quantum Monte Carlo
Acta Physica Slovaca. Reviews and Tutorials, 2000
Quantum Monte Carlo (QMC) is an advanced simulation methodology for studies of manybody quantum systems. The QMC approaches combine analytical insights with stochastic computational techniques for efficient solution of several classes of important many-body problems such as the stationary Schrödinger equation. QMC methods of various flavors have been applied to a great variety of systems spanning continuous and lattice quantum models, molecular and condensed systems, BEC-BCS ultracold condensates, nuclei, etc. In this review, we focus on the electronic structure QMC, i.e., methods relevant for systems described by the electron-ion Hamiltonians. Some of the key QMC achievements include direct treatment of electron correlation, accuracy in predicting energy differences and favorable scaling in the system size. Calculations of atoms, molecules, clusters and solids have demonstrated QMC applicability to real systems with hundreds of electrons while providing 90-95% of the correlation energy and energy differences typically within a few percent of experiments. Advances in accuracy beyond these limits are hampered by the so-called fixed-node approximation which is used to circumvent the notorious fermion sign problem. Many-body nodes of fermion states and their properties have therefore become one of the important topics for further progress in predictive power and efficiency of QMC calculations. Some of our recent results on the wave function nodes and related nodal domain topologies will be briefly reviewed. This includes analysis of few-electron systems and descriptions of exact and approximate nodes using transformations and projections of the highly-dimensional nodal hypersurfaces into the 3D space. Studies of fermion nodes offer new insights into topological properties of eigenstates such as explicit demonstrations that generic fermionic ground states exhibit the minimal number of two nodal domains. Recently proposed trial wave functions based on pfaffians with pairing orbitals are presented and their nodal properties are tested in calculations of first row atoms and molecules. Finally, backflow "dressed" coordinates are introduced as another possibility for capturing correlation effects and for decreasing the fixed-node bias. detailed analysis of theoretical ideas. Indeed, QMC is very much in the line of "it from bit" paradigm, alongside, for example, of substantional computational efforts in quantum chromodynamics which not only predict hadron masses but, at the same time, contribute to the validation of the fundamental theory. Similar simulations efforts exist in other areas of physics as well. Just a few decades ago it was almost unthinkable that one would be able to solve Schrödinger equation for hundreds of electrons in an explicit, many-body wave function framework. Today, such calculations are feasible using available computational resources. At the same time, much more remains to be done, of course, to make the methods more insightful, more efficient and their application less laborious. We hope this overview will contribute to the growing interest in this rapidly developing field of research.
Quantum Monte Carlo algorithms for electronic structure at the petascale; the Endstation project
Journal of Physics: Conference Series, 2008
Over the past two decades, continuum quantum Monte Carlo (QMC) has proved to be an invaluable tool for predicting of the properties of matter from fundamental principles. By solving the Schrödinger equation through a stochastic projection, it achieves the greatest accuracy and reliability of methods available for physical systems containing more than a few quantum particles. QMC enjoys scaling favorable to quantum chemical methods, with a computational effort which grows with the second or third power of system size. This accuracy and scalability has enabled scientific discovery across a broad spectrum of disciplines. The current methods perform very efficiently at the terascale. The quantum Monte Carlo Endstation project is a collaborative effort among researchers in the field to develop a new generation of algorithms, and their efficient implementations, which will take advantage of the upcoming petaflop architectures. Some aspects of these developments are discussed here. These tools will expand the accuracy, efficiency and range of QMC applicability and enable us to tackle challenges which are currently out of reach. The methods will be applied to several important problems including electronic and structural properties of water, transition metal oxides, nanosystems and ultracold atoms.
The Valence-Bond Quantum Monte Carlo Method
Elsevier eBooks, 2022
The VB-QMC method is presented in this chapter. It consists of using in quantum Monte Carlo (QMC) approaches with a wave function expressed as a usually short expansion of classical Valence-Bond (VB) structures supplemented by a Jastrow factor to account for dynamical correlation. Two variants exist: the VB-VMC (using variational Monte Carlo) and VB-DMC (using diffusion Monte Carlo) methods. QMC algorithms circumvent the notorious non-orthogonality issue of classical VB approaches, and allow highly efficient calculations on massively parallel machines. Calculation of VB weights and resonance energies are possible at the VB-VMC level, which makes VB-VMC a correlated method retaining all the interpretative capabilities of classical VB methods. Several recent applications are shown to illustrate the potential of this method as a modern alternative to classical VB methods to study ground and excited states of molecules. KEYWORDS Valence Bond; non-orthogonal wave functions; chemical bonding; quantum Monte Carlo; variational Monte Carlo; diffusion Monte Carlo; interpretative methods; structure weights; resonance energies; excited states; hypervalency; charge-shift bonding; three-electron bond. GLOSSARY • BOVB Breathing-orbital Valence Bond, a VB method in which each VB structure is allowed to have a different set of orbitals. • CASPT2 Complete-active-space second-order perturbation theory, a standard wavefunction method for both static and dynamical correlation. • CASSCF Complete-active-space self-consistent field, a standard wave-function method for static correlation. • CI Configuration interaction, a standard wave-function method.
Q-Chem 2.0: a high-performanceab initio electronic structure program package
Journal of Computational Chemistry, 2000
Q-Chem 2.0 is a new release of an electronic structure program package, capable of performing first principles calculations on the ground and excited states of molecules using both density functional theory and wave function-based methods. A review of the technical features contained within Q-Chem 2.0 is presented. This article contains brief descriptive discussions of the key physical features of all new algorithms and theoretical models, together with sample calculations that illustrate their performance.
TurboRVB: A many-body toolkit for ab initio electronic simulations by quantum Monte Carlo
The Journal of Chemical Physics
TurboRVB is a computational package for ab initio Quantum Monte Carlo (QMC) simulations of both molecular and bulk electronic systems. The code implements two types of well established QMC algorithms: Variational Monte Carlo (VMC), and Diffusion Monte Carlo in its robust and efficient lattice regularized variant. A key feature of the code is the possibility of using strongly correlated many-body wave functions, capable of describing several materials with very high accuracy, even when standard mean-field approaches (e.g., density functional theory (DFT)) fail. The electronic wave function (WF) is obtained by applying a Jastrow factor, which takes into account dynamical correlations, to the most general mean-field ground state, written either as an antisymmetrized geminal product with spin-singlet pairing, or as a Pfaffian, including both singlet and triplet correlations. This wave function can be viewed as an efficient implementation of the so-called resonating valence bond (RVB) ansatz, first proposed by L. Pauling and P. W. Anderson in quantum chemistry and condensed matter physics, respectively. The RVB ansatz implemented in TurboRVB has a large variational freedom, including the Jastrow correlated Slater determinant as its simplest, but nontrivial case. Moreover, it has the remarkable advantage of remaining with an affordable computational cost, proportional to the one spent for the evaluation of a single Slater determinant. Therefore, its application to large systems is computationally feasible. The WF is expanded in a localized basis set. Several basis set functions are implemented, such as Gaussian, Slater, and mixed types, with no restriction on the choice of their contraction. The code implements the adjoint algorithmic differentiation that enables a very efficient evaluation of energy derivatives, comprising the ionic forces. Thus, one can perform structural optimizations and molecular dynamics in the canonical NVT ensemble at the VMC level. For the electronic part, a full WF optimization (Jastrow and antisymmetric parts together) is made possible thanks to state-ofthe-art stochastic algorithms for energy minimization. In the optimization procedure, the first guess can be obtained at the mean-field level by a built-in DFT driver. The code has been efficiently parallelized by using a hybrid MPI-OpenMP protocol, that is also an ideal environment for exploiting the computational power of modern GPU accelerators.
Advances in theory and algorithms for electronic structure calculations must be incorporated into program packages to enable them to become routinely used by the broader chemical community. This work reviews advances made over the past five years or so that constitute the major improvements contained in a new release of the Q-Chem quantum chemistry package, together with illustrative timings and applications. Specific developments discussed include fast methods for density functional theory calculations, linear scaling evaluation of energies, NMR chemical shifts and electric properties, fast auxiliary basis function methods for correlated energies and gradients, equation-of-motion coupled cluster methods for ground and excited states, geminal wavefunctions, embedding methods and techniques for exploring potential energy surfaces.