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Search indexed NASA NTRS and DOE OSTI research on propulsion, heat transfer, battery materials and energy systems. Follow report and document links to the original sources.

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At least 505 records · Page 28
All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
DOE OSTI2026

HfTi_BCC_SolidSolution_128atoms_VASP6

We performed density functional theory (DFT) calculations for body-centered-cubic (BCC) structures with 128 lattices sites of solid solution binary alloys hafnium-titanium (Hf-Ti). The electronic structures of alloys have been calculated using Vienna Ab initio Simulation Package (VASP). Within this package the DFT approach is used to reduce many-body Schrodinger equation to set of single particle Kohn-Sham (KS) equations. The generalized electronic exchange-correlation functional is described by generalized gradient approximation with the Perdew-Burke-Ernzerhof parametrization. The electron-ion interactions is described by pseudopotentials developed within the plane-wave basis projector augmented-wave (PAW) approach. These pseudopotentials are available at the VASP portal (http://cms.mpi.univie.ac.at/vasp/). Our calculations have been run with the pseudopotentials treating s and p semi-core states as valence in case for the elements Hf and Ti. The electronic densities and potentials are expanded over plane-waves with energy cutoff of 350 eV. 2x2x2 k-mesh and normal precision were used. The alloys were modeled by supercell containing 128 randomly distributed atoms. At initial step the atoms occupy perfect bcc lattice cites. This initial structure was optimized until energy changes less than 1e-6 eV, while forces acting on atoms don't exceed 1e-2 eV/angstrom. The electron-ion interaction is described by PAW pseudopotentials. The calculations have been collected by sampling chemical compositions across the entire compositional range. The chemical compositions have been sampled by progressively changing the number of atoms per constituent by 4. For each chemical composition of binaries and ternaries, the first-principle calculations have been run for 100 randomized arrangements of the constituents on the BCC lattice sites. We collected data for a total of 3,100 randomized atomic structures over 31 chemical compositions. The calculations have been collected on Air Force HPC11 cluster using the VASP 6.5.1. Additional methodology and file structure information is available in the dataset README.txt file.

36 MATERIALS SCIENCE↗
DOE OSTI2023

Metals and Quantum Materials with Spin-orbit Interactions by Quantum Monte Carlo methods

The key goals of this project were as follows: 1) Analysis and benchmarks of electron correlation effects recovered in the fixed-node approximation that is inherent to quantum Monte Carlo (QMC) method as applied to metallic states; 2) development of new algorithms for electron spin-degrees of freedom to be treated as explicit quantum variables; 3) designing electronic structure QMC algorithm for efficient evaluation of spin-orbit effects in systems with heavy atoms; 4) adapting the algorithm to complex wave functions and developing corresponding fixed-phase approximation; 5) design and testing of algorithm for valence-only non-local spin-orbit operators; 6) analysis of fixed-node vs fixed-phase errors and their comparisons. The key accomplishments: i) We carried out a systematic study of Li systems by the fixed-node diffusion Monte Carlo method. This involved Li atom, molecule, cluster and solid calculated by the full range of QMC methods including fixed-node QMC.

75 CONDENSED MATTER PHYSICS, SUPERCONDUCTIVITY AND↗
DOE OSTI2019

Ion kinetics and nonlinear saturation of current-driven instabilities relevant to hollow cathode plasmas

Ion kinetics and time evolution of bulk plasma properties in the nonlinear saturation regime of a collisionless current-driven instability are studied using a 1D Vlasov–Poisson simulation. In the simulations, the ratio of initial electron bulk velocity to initial electron thermal velocity, called the electron Mach number, ranges from 0.5 to 2.5, and electron-to-ion temperature ratio is 10. A significant population of backstreaming high-energy ions is observed when the initial electron Mach number is larger than or equal to 1.3, which agrees with previous literature indicating transition to the Buneman instability. The simulations suggest that the electrons trapped in large-amplitude waves result in a bi-directional ion acoustic wave, which generates a backward-propagating high-energy ion distribution. Here, a concise formula that describes the high-energy ion distribution and potential fluctuation amplitude are obtained as a function of initial electron Mach numbers. Sputtering rate calculations using the non-Maxwellian distributions for ions obtained from the simulation and Maxwellian ion distributions of temperatures ranging from 0.5 to 4.0 eV are compared, illustrating the potential contribution of kinetic effects on cathode erosion.

70 PLASMA PHYSICS AND FUSION TECHNOLOGY↗
DOE OSTI2021

Interpretations of ground-state symmetry breaking and strong correlation in wavefunction and density functional theories

Significance The ground state of a quantum mechanical system is the lowest-energy eigenstate of the Hamiltonian. In isolation, it persists unchanged forever, with symmetries dictated by those of the Hamiltonian. But near-eigenstates of broken symmetry can persist for long times, even on the scale of human measurement. The appearance of broken symmetries of the electron density or spin density in a density functional calculation can reveal strong correlations among the electrons that are present in a symmetry-unbroken wavefunction. Symmetry breaking can arise when a wave-like fluctuation drops to zero frequency. The presented examples are the stretched hydrogen molecule, antiferromagnetism in solids, and the static charge-density wave in a low-density jellium, which is shown quantitatively to be a zero-frequency plasma wave.

42 ENGINEERING↗
DOE OSTI2024

Solution of the Schrödinger equation for quasi-one-dimensional materials using helical waves

We formulate and implement a spectral method for solving the Schrödinger equation, as it applies to quasi-one-dimensional materials and structures. This allows for computation of the electronic structure of important technological materials such as nanotubes (of arbitrary chirality), nanowires, nanoribbons, chiral nanoassemblies, nanosprings and nanocoils, in an accurate, efficient and systematic manner. Our work is motivated by the observation that one of the most successful methods for carrying out electronic structure calculations of bulk/crystalline systems — the plane-wave method — is a spectral method based on eigenfunction expansion. Our scheme avoids computationally onerous approximations involving periodic supercells often employed in conventional plane-wave calculations of quasi-one-dimensional materials, and also overcomes several limitations of other discretization strategies, e.g., those based on finite differences and atomic orbitals. The basis functions in our method — called helical waves (or twisted waves) — are eigenfunctions of the Laplacian with symmetry adapted boundary conditions, and are expressible in terms of plane waves and Bessel functions in helical coordinates. We describe the setup of fast transforms to carry out discretization of the governing equations using our basis set, and the use of matrix-free iterative diagonalization to obtain the electronic eigenstates. Miscellaneous computational details, including the choice of eigensolvers, use of a preconditioning scheme, evaluation of oscillatory radial integrals and the imposition of a kinetic energy cutoff are discussed. We have implemented these strategies into a computational package called HelicES (Helical Electronic Structure). We demonstrate the utility of our method in carrying out systematic electronic structure calculations of various quasi-one-dimensional materials through numerous examples involving nanotubes, nanoribbons and nanowires. We also explore the convergence properties of our method, and assess its accuracy and computational efficiency by comparison against reference finite difference, transfer matrix method and plane-wave results. We anticipate that our method will find applications in computational nanomechanics and multiscale modeling, for carrying out transport calculations of interest to the field of semiconductor devices, and for the discovery of novel chiral phases of matter that are of relevance to the burgeoning quantum hardware industry.

75 CONDENSED MATTER PHYSICS, SUPERCONDUCTIVITY AND↗
DOE OSTI2018

Depth-resolved charge reconstruction at the LaNi O 3 / CaMn O 3 interface

Here, rational design of low-dimensional electronic phenomena at oxide interfaces is currently considered to be one of the most promising schemes for realizing new energy-efficient logic and memory devices. An atomically abrupt interface between paramagnetic LaNiO 3 and antiferromagnetic CaMnO 3 exhibits interfacial ferromagnetism, which can be tuned via a thickness-dependent metal-insulator transition in LaNiO 3 . Once fully understood, such emergent functionality could turn this archetypal Mott-interface system into a key building block for the above-mentioned future devices. Here, we use depth-resolved standing-wave photoemission spectroscopy in conjunction with scanning transmission electron microscopy and x-ray absorption spectroscopy, to demonstrate a depth-dependent charge reconstruction at the LaNiO 3 /CaMnO 3 interface. Our measurements reveal an increased concentration of Mn 3+ and Ni 2+ cations at the interface, which create an electronic environment favorable for the emergence of interfacial ferromagnetism mediated via the Mn 4+ -Mn 3+ ferromagnetic double exchange and Ni 2+ -O-Mn 4+ superexchange mechanisms. Our findings suggest a strategy for designing functional Mott oxide heterostructures by tuning the interfacial cation characteristics via controlled manipulation of thickness, strain, and ionic defect states.

36 MATERIALS SCIENCE↗
DOE OSTI2023

Stochastic and mixed density functional theory within the projector augmented wave formalism for simulation of warm dense matter

Stochastic density functional theory (DFT) and mixed stochastic-deterministic DFT are burgeoning approaches for the calculation of the equation of state and transport properties in materials under extreme conditions. In the intermediate warm dense matter regime, a state between correlated condensed matter and kinetic plasma, electrons can range from being highly localized around nuclei to delocalized over the whole simulation cell. The plane-wave basis pseudopotential approach is thus the typical tool of choice for modeling such systems at the DFT level. Unfortunately, stochastic DFT methods scale as the square of the maximum plane-wave energy in this basis. To reduce the effect of this scaling and improve the overall description of the electrons within the pseudopotential approximation, we present stochastic and mixed DFT approaches developed and implemented within the projector augmented wave formalism. In conclusion, we compare results between the different DFT approaches for both single-point and molecular dynamics trajectories and present calculations of self-diffusion coefficients of solid density carbon from 1 to 50 eV.

75 CONDENSED MATTER PHYSICS, SUPERCONDUCTIVITY AND↗
DOE OSTI2024

Direct observation of entangled electronic-nuclear wave packets

We present momentum resolved covariance measurements of entangled electronic-nuclear wave packets created and probed with octave spanning phaselocked ultrafast pulses. We launch vibrational wave packets on multiple electronic states via multiphoton absorption, and probe these wave packets via strong field double ionization using a second phaselocked pulse. Momentum resolved covariance mapping of the fragment ions highlights the nuclear motion, while measurements of the yield as a function of the relative phase between pump and probe pulses highlight the electronic coherence. The combined measurements allow us to directly visualize the entanglement between the electronic and nuclear degrees of freedom and follow the evolution of the complete wavefunction. Published by the American Physical Society 2024

Moğol, Gönenç↗
DOE OSTI2019

High-gain leaky surface acoustic wave amplifier in epitaxial InGaAs on lithium niobate heterostructure

Active surface acoustic wave components have the potential to transform RF front ends by consolidating functionalities that currently occur across multiple chip technologies, leading to reduced insertion loss from converting back and forth between acoustic and electronic domains in addition to improved size and power efficiency. This letter reflects a significant advance in these active devices with a compact, high-gain, and low-power leaky surface acoustic wave amplifier based on the acoustoelectric effect. Devices use an acoustically thin semi-insulating InGaAs surface film on a YX lithium niobate substrate to achieve exceptionally high acoustoelectric interaction strength via an epitaxial In 0.53 Ga 0.47 As(P)/InP quaternary layer structure and wafer-scale bonding. Here, we demonstrate 1.9 dB of gain per acoustic wavelength and power consumption of 90 mW for 30 dB of electronic gain. Despite the strong intrinsic leaky propagation loss, 5 dB of terminal gain is obtained for a semiconductor that is only 338 μm long due to state-of-the-art heterogenous integration and an improved material platform.

42 ENGINEERING↗
DOE OSTI2022

Toward a QUBO-Based Density Matrix Electronic Structure Method

Density matrix electronic structure theory is used in many quantum chemistry methods to “alleviate” the computational cost that arises from directly using wave functions. Although density matrix based methods are computationally more efficient than wave function based methods, significant computational effort is involved. Because the Schrödinger equation needs to be solved as an eigenvalue problem, the time-to-solution scales cubically with the system size in mean-field type approaches such as Hartree–Fock and density functional theory and is solved as many times in order to reach charge or field self-consistency. We hereby propose and study a method to compute the density matrix by using a quadratic unconstrained binary optimization (QUBO) solver. This method could be useful to solve the problem with quantum computers and, more specifically, quantum annealers. Our proposed approach is based on a direct construction of the density matrix using a QUBO eigensolver. We explore the main parameters of the algorithm focusing on precision and efficiency. We show that, while direct construction of the density matrix using a QUBO formulation is possible, the efficiency and precision have room for improvement. Moreover, calculations performed with quantum annealing on D-Wave’s new Advantage quantum computer are compared with results obtained with classical simulated annealing, further highlighting some problems of the proposed method. Finally, we also suggest alternative methods that could lead to a more efficient QUBO-based density matrix construction.

37 INORGANIC, ORGANIC, PHYSICAL, AND ANALYTICAL CH↗
DOE OSTI2025

Performance of Diffusion Monte Carlo Calculations for Predicting the Relative Energies of Quinoidal and Nonquinoidal Species

Coupled cluster singles and doubles with perturbative triples [CCSD(T)] and single determinant fixed-node diffusion Monte Carlo (SD-DMC) have emerged as two of the most useful methods for providing benchmark reaction and interaction energies of chemical systems without strong static correlation. The errors in DMC energies are dominated by an inexact description of the nodal surfaces for electron exchange. One of the main approaches to addressing the fixed-node error is to use multideterminant (MD) trial wave functions. We consider here the energy differences between pairs of related molecules with aromatic and quinoidal structures as well as between quinoidal isomers. Quinoidal systems tend to have some diradical character, leading one to anticipate that SD-DMC calculations may face challenges in accurately describing their energetics. The MD trial wave functions were generated from the complete active space calculations. A comparison is made with the predictions of well-converged CCSD(T) calculations.

basis sets↗
DOE OSTI2023

Pair breaking in superconductors with strong spin-orbit coupling

Here we study the influence of symmetry-breaking perturbations on superconductivity in multiorbital materials, with a particular focus on an external magnetic field. We introduce the field-fitness function which characterizes the pair-breaking effects of the perturbation on a given superconducting state. For even-parity superconductors we find that this field-fitness function for an external magnetic field is one, implying that the paramagnetic response is controlled only by a generalized effective g factor. For odd-parity superconductors, the interplay of the effective g factor and the field-fitness function can lead to counterintuitive results. We demonstrate this for p-wave pairing in the effective j = $\frac{3}{2}$ electronic states of the Luttinger-Kohn model.

75 CONDENSED MATTER PHYSICS, SUPERCONDUCTIVITY AND↗
DOE OSTI2019

Second-Order Stationary Solutions for Fermions in an External Coulomb Field

We have studied self-conjugate second-order equations with spinor wavefunctions for fermions moving in an external Coulomb field. For stationary states, the equations are characterized by separated states with positive and negative energies, which render probabilistic interpretation possible. For the Coulomb field of attraction, the energy spectrum of the second-order equation coincides with the spectrum of the Dirac equation, while the probability densities of states are slightly different. For a Coulomb field of repulsion, there exists an impermeable potential barrier with radius depending on the classical electron radius and on the electron energy. The existence of the impermeable barrier does not contradict the results of experiment for determining the inner electron structure and does not affect (in the lowest order of perturbation theory) the Coulomb electron scattering cross section. The existence of the impermeable barrier can lead to positron confinement in supercritical nuclei with Z ≥ 170 in case of realization of spontaneous emission of vacuum electron–positron pairs.

72 PHYSICS OF ELEMENTARY PARTICLES AND FIELDS↗
DOE OSTI2016

Tagged spectator DIS off a polarized spin-1 target

We discuss the process of deep-inelastic electron scattering (DIS) on the polarized deuteron with detection of a nucleon in the nuclear fragmentation region ('spectator tagging'). We cover (a) the general structure of the DIS cross section; (b) the structure functions of the process in the impulse approximation using deuteron light-front wave functions; (c) the extraction of free neutron structure by extracting the residue of observables at the free nucleon pole ('pole extrapolation'). As an application we consider the extraction of the free neutron structure function g1n through polarized electron scattering on the longitudinally polarized deuteron with proton tagging and on-shell extrapolation in the recoil momentum, possible at an EIC with polarized deuteron beams and forward detectors.

Cosyn, Wim↗
DOE OSTI2024

Detecting Multipartite Entanglement Patterns Using Single-Particle Green’s Functions

Here, we present a protocol for detecting multipartite entanglement in itinerant many-body electronic systems using single-particle Green’s functions. To achieve this, we first establish a connection between the quantum Fisher information and single-particle Green’s functions by constructing a set of witness operators built out of single electron creation and destruction operators in a doubled system. This set of witness operators is indexed by a momentum k. We compute the quantum Fisher information for these witness operators and show that for thermal ensembles it can be expressed as an autoconvolution of the single-particle spectral function. We then apply our framework to a one-dimensional fermionic system to showcase its effectiveness in detecting entanglement in itinerant electron models. We observe that the detected entanglement level is sensitive to the wave vector associated with witness operator. Our protocol will permit detecting entanglement in many-body systems using scanning tunneling microscopy and angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy, two spectroscopies that measure the single-particle Green’s function. It offers the prospect of the experimental detection of entanglement through spectroscopies beyond the established route of measuring the dynamical spin response.

75 CONDENSED MATTER PHYSICS, SUPERCONDUCTIVITY AND↗
DOE OSTI2020

Hard x-ray standing-wave photoemission study of the interfaces in a BiFeO$_3$/La$_{0.7}$Sr$_{0.3}$MnO$_3$ superlattice

Hybrid multiferroics such as BiFeO$_3$ (BFO) and La$_{0.7}$Sr$_{0.3}$MnO$_3$ (LSMO) heterostructures are highly interesting functional systems due to their complex electronic and magnetic properties. One of the key parameters influencing the emergent properties is the quality of interfaces, where varying interdiffusion lengths can give rise to different chemistry and distinctive electronic states. Here we report high-resolution depth resolved chemical and electronic investigation of BFO/LSMO superlattice using standing-wave hard X-ray photoemission spectroscopy in the first-order Bragg as well as near-total-reflection geometry. Our results show that the interfaces of BFO on top of LSMO are atomically abrupt, while the LSMO on top of BFO interfaces show an interdiffusion length of around 1.2 unit cells. The two interfaces also exhibit different chemical gradients, with the BFO/LSMO interface being Sr-terminated by a spectroscopically distinctive high binding energy component in Sr 2p core-level spectra, which is spatially contained within 1 unit cell from the interface. From the electronic point of view, unique valence band features were observed for bulk-BFO, bulk-LSMO and their interfaces. Our X-ray optical analysis revealed a unique electronic signature at the BFO/LSMO interface, which we attribute to the coupling between those respective layers. Valence band decomposition based on the Bragg-reflection standing-wave measurement also revealed the band alignment between BFO and LSMO layers. Our work demonstrates that standing-wave hard x-ray photoemission is a reliable non-destructive technique for probing depth-resolved electronic structure of buried layers and interfaces with sub-unit-cell resolution. Equivalent investigations can be successfully applied to a broad class of material such as perovskite complex oxides with emergent interfacial phenomena.

Martins, HP↗