Home > Research > Publications & Outputs > Diffusion quantum Monte Carlo study of three-di...

Electronic data

  • E085116

    Rights statement: © 2004 The American Physical Society

    Final published version, 281 KB, PDF document

Links

Text available via DOI:

View graph of relations

Diffusion quantum Monte Carlo study of three-dimensional Wigner crystals

Research output: Contribution to Journal/MagazineJournal articlepeer-review

Published
Close
Article number085116
<mark>Journal publication date</mark>27/02/2004
<mark>Journal</mark>Physical review B
Issue number8
Volume69
Number of pages10
Publication StatusPublished
<mark>Original language</mark>English

Abstract

We report diffusion quantum Monte Carlo calculations of three-dimensional Wigner crystals in the density range rs=100–150. We have tested different types of orbital for use in the approximate wave functions but none improve upon the simple Gaussian form. The Gaussian exponents are optimized by directly minimizing the diffusion quantum Monte Carlo energy. We have carefully investigated and sought to minimize the potential biases in our Monte Carlo results. We conclude that the uniform electron gas undergoes a transition from a ferromagnetic fluid to a body-centered-cubic Wigner crystal at rs=106±1. The diffusion quantum Monte Carlo results are compared with those from Hartree-Fock and Hartree theory in order to understand the role played by exchange and correlation in Wigner crystals. We also study “floating” Wigner crystals and give results for their pair-correlation functions.

Bibliographic note

© 2004 The American Physical Society