Potential energy surface studies via a single root multireference coupled cluster theory

J Chem Phys. 2010 Aug 21;133(7):074102. doi: 10.1063/1.3467899.

Abstract

We have employed complete active space based single root multireference coupled cluster method (the resulting method is referred to by the acronym sr-MRCC) to compute the potential energy surfaces (PESs) of some well studied "protypical model" systems for which a highly accurate and reliable database is available for comparison. As that of state-specific theory, the sr-MRCC approach focuses and correlates one state while using a multiconfigurational reference and thus it naturally avoids intruder states. The present method is structurally different from the well known state specific multireference coupled cluster (SS-MRCC) method introduced by Mahapatra et al. [Mol. Phys. 94, 157 (1998)]. As that of the SS-MRCC theory, the present method is also based on the Jeziorski-Monkhorst ansatz where a different exponential cluster operator exp(T(mu)) acts on its corresponding model function phi(mu). The final cluster finding equations contain coupling between the cluster operators for all the mu, which are mainly responsible to prove the extensivity of both the cluster amplitudes and the energy. The present sr-MRCC theory is size-extensive and size-consistent when localized orbitals are used. The systems considered here exhibit varying degrees of degeneracy at different regions of PES. The treatment of these systems via traditional effective Hamiltonian based methods suffers from divergence problems in the iterative solution of the CC equations (the issue termed as "intruder state"). The sr-MRCC results lie closer to the ones obtained by the SS-MRCC method for these systems. To judge the efficacy of the present method, we have compared our results with other previously published theoretical estimations, which clearly indicate that the present method is reliable in studying the dissociation PES of states plagued by electronic degeneracy as well as notorious intruder effects. The highly satisfactory performance of the sr-MRCC method, vis-a-vis the other sophisticated methods, in describing the lowest and the first excited singlet states of BeH(2) at points of high degeneracy is noticeable.