Two-component density functional theory within the projector augmented-wave approach: Accurate and self-consistent computations of positron lifetimes and momentum distributions

Abstract

Many techniques have been developed in the past in order to compute positron lifetimes in materials from first principles. However, there is still a lack of a fast and accurate self-consistent scheme that could handle accurately the forces acting on the ions induced by the presence of the positron. We will show in this paper that we have reached this goal by developing the two-component density functional theory within the projector augmented-wave (PAW) method in the open-source code abinit. This tool offers the accuracy of the all-electron methods with the computational efficiency of the plane-wave ones. We can thus deal with supercells that contain few hundreds to thousands of atoms to study point defects as well as more extended defects clusters. Moreover, using the PAW basis set allows us to use techniques able to, for instance, treat strongly correlated systems or spin-orbit coupling, which are necessary to study heavy elements, such as the actinides or their compounds.