Category:Bethe-Salpeter equations

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The formalism of the Bethe-Salpeter equation (BSE) allows for calculating the polarizability with the electron-hole interaction and constitutes the state of the art for calculating absorption spectra in solids.

Theory

The Bethe-Salpeter equation

In the BSE, the excitation energies correspond to the eigenvalues of the following linear problem


The matrices and describe the resonant and anti-resonant transitions between the occupied and unoccupied states

The energies and orbitals of these states are usually obtained in a calculation, but DFT and Hybrid functional calculations can be used as well. The electron-electron interaction and electron-hole interaction are described via the bare Coulomb and the screened potential .

The coupling between resonant and anti-resonant terms is described via terms and

Due to the presence of this coupling, the Bethe-Salpeter Hamiltonian is non-Hermitian.

The Tamm-Dancoff approximation

A common approximation to the BSE is the Tamm-Dancoff approximation (TDA), which neglects the coupling between resonant and anti-resonant terms, i.e., and . Hence, the TDA reduces the BSE to a Hermitian problem

In reciprocal space, the matrix is written as

where is the cell volume, is the bare Coulomb potential without the long-range part

and the screened Coulomb potential

Here, the dielectric function describes the screening in within the random-phase approximation (RPA)

Although the dielectric function is frequency-dependent, the static approximation is considered a standard for practical BSE calculations.

The macroscopic dielectric which account for the excitonic effects is found via eigenvalues and eigenvectors of the BSE

How to

References