Alessandro Roggero

Quantum Monte Carlo with Coupled-Cluster wave functions

ECT*, Villa Tambosi, I-38123 Villazzano (Trento), Italy(Dated: May 3, 2013)We introduce a novel many body method which combines two powerful many body techniques,viz., quantum Monte Carlo and coupled cluster theory. Coupled cluster wave functions are intro-duced as importance functions in a Monte Carlo method designed for the configuration interactionframework to provide rigorous upper bounds to the ground state energy. We benchmark our methodon the homogeneous electron gas in momentum space. The importance function used is the coupledcluster doubles wave function. We show that the computational resources required in our methodscale polynomially with system size. Our energy upper bounds are in very good agreement withprevious calculations of similar accuracy, and they can be systematically improved by includinghigher order excitations in the coupled cluster wave function.

Ground-state properties of 4 He and 16 O extrapolated from lattice QCD with pionless EFT

U.S. Department of Energy, Office of Science, Office of Nuclear Physics [DE-AC02-06CH11357, DE-FG02-04ER41338]; European Union Research and Innovation program Horizon [654002]; NSF [AST-1333607, PHY15-15738]; Office of Science of the U.S. Department of Energy [DE-AC02-06CH11357]

Microscopically constrained mean field models from chiral nuclear thermodynamics

We explore the use of mean field models to approximate microscopic nuclear equations of state derived from chiral effective field theory across the densities and temperatures relevant for simu- lating astrophysical phenomena such as core-collapse supernovae and binary neutron star mergers. We consider both relativistic mean field theory with scalar and vector meson exchange as well as energy density functionals based on Skyrme phenomenology and compare to thermodynamic equa- tions of state derived from chiral two- and three-nucleon forces in many-body perturbation theory. Quantum Monte Carlo simulations of symmetric nuclear matter and pure neutron matter are used to determine the density regimes in which perturbation theory with chiral nuclear forces is valid. Within the theoretical uncertainties associated with the many-body methods, we find that select mean field models describe well microscopic nuclear thermodynamics. As an additional consistency requirement, we study as well the single-particle properties of nucleons in a hot/dense environment, which affect e.g., charged-current weak reactions in neutron-rich matter. The identified mean field models can be used across a larger range of densities and temperatures in astrophysical simulations than more computationally expensive microscopic models.

Constraining the Skyrme energy density functional with quantum Monte Carlo calculations

We study the problem of an impurity in fully polarized (spin-up) low density neutron matter with the help of an accurate quantum Monte Carlo method in conjunction with a realistic nucleon-nucleon interaction derived from chiral effective field theory at next-to-next-to-leading-order. Our calculations show that the behavior of the proton spin-down impurity is very similar to that of a polaron in a fully polarized unitary Fermi gas. We show that our results can be used to put tight constraints on the time-odd parts of the energy density functional, independent of the time-even parts, in the density regime relevant to neutron-rich nuclei and compact astrophysical objects such as neutron stars and supernovae.

Use of the Sumudu transform to extract response functions from Quantum Monte Carlo calculations

We review an ab-initio method for calculating the dynamical structure function of an interacting many-body quantum system. The method consists in coupling a generalized integral transform approach with imaginary time Quantum Monte Carlo calculations. The strength of the method has been tested on the excitation spectrum of bulk atomic 4He. The peculiar form of the kernel as a representation of the delta-function has allowed to minimize the ill-posedness of the integral transform inversion. In fact it has been possible to obtain, at a considerable degree of reliability, both position and width of the collective excitations in the maxon-roton region, as well as the second collective peak. What we stress here is the ability of such a 4-function-like kernel, for which one can control position and width, to maintain in the transformed space the characteristics of the collective structures. The application to the coherent and incoherent density excitation spectrum of liquid 4He is discussed.

Thermal conductivity and impurity scattering in the accreting neutron star crust

We calculate the thermal conductivity of electrons for the strongly correlated multi-component ion plasma expected in the outer layers of neutron stars crust employing a Path Integral Monte Carlo (PIMC) approach. This allows us to isolate the low energy response of the ions and use it to calculate the electron scattering rate and the electron thermal conductivity. We find that the scattering rate is enhanced by a factor 2-4 compared to earlier calculations based on the simpler electron-impurity scattering formalism. This findings directly impacts the interpretation of thermal relaxation observed in transiently accreting neutron stars and has implications for the composition and nuclear reactions in the crust that occur during accretion.

Small bits of cold dense matter

Abstract The behavior of QCD at high baryon density and low temperature is crucial to understanding the properties of neutron stars and gravitational waves emitted during their mergers. In this paper we study small systems of baryons in periodic boundary conditions to probe the properties of QCD at high baryon density. By comparing calculations based on nucleon degrees of freedom to simple quark models we show that specific features of the nuclear spectrum, including shell structure and nucleon pairing, emerge if nucleons are the primary degrees of freedom. Very small systems should also be amenable to studies in lattice QCD, unlike larger systems where the fermion sign problem is much more severe. Through comparisons of lattice QCD and nuclear calculations it should be possible to gain, at least at a semi-quantitative level, more understanding of the cold dense equation of state as probed in neutron stars.

Nuclear pasta in hot dense matter and its implications for neutrino scattering

We find that the abundance of large clusters of nucleons in neutron-rich matter at sub-nuclear density is greatly reduced by finite temperature effects when matter is close to beta-equilibrium. Large nuclei and exotic non-spherical nuclear configurations called pasta, favored in the vicinity of the transition to uniform matter at

Variational and Diffusion Monte Carlo Approaches to the Nuclear Few- and Many-Body Problem

T=0

Quantum Monte Carlo calculations of neutron matter with nonlocal chiral interactions.

, dissolve at relatively low temperature. For matter close to beta-equilibrium we find that the pasta melting temperature is