Optimization of the Jastrow factor in the correlated wave function of electrons using the first-principles transcorrelated method for solid-state calculations

Abstract

The transcorrelated (TC) method is one of the wave-function-based methods used for first-principles electronic structure calculations, and in terms of the computational cost is applicable to solid-state calculation. In this method, a many-body wave function of electrons is approximated as a product of the Jastrow factor and the Slater determinant, and the first-principles Hamiltonian is similarity-transformed by the Jastrow factor. The Schrödinger equation is rewritten as an eigenvalue problem for this similarity-transformed Hamiltonian, from which one obtains a self-consistent field (SCF) equation for optimizing one-electron orbitals in the Slater determinant at low computational cost. In contrast, optimization of the Jastrow factor is computationally much more expensive and has not been performed for solid-state calculation of the TC method before. In this study, we develop a new method for optimizing the Jastrow factor at a reasonable computational cost using the random-phase approximation (RPA) and pseudo-variance minimization. We apply this method to some simple solids, and find that the band gap of a wide-band-gap insulator is much improved by RPA.