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Appendix A - Functional equations

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 June 2012

Richard M. Martin
Affiliation:
University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign
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Summary

Summary

A functional F[f] is a mapping of an entire function f onto a value. In electronic structure, functionals play a central role, not only in density functional theory, but also in the formulation of most of the theoretical methods as functionals of the underlying variables, in particular the wavefunctions. This appendix deals with the general formulation and derivation of variational equations from the functionals.

Basic definitions and variational equations

The difference between a function f(x) and a functional F[f] is that a function is defined to be a mapping of a variable x to a result (a number) f(x); whereas a functional is a mapping of an entire function f to a resulting number F[f]. The functional F[f], denoted by square brackets, depends upon the function f over its range of definition f(x) in terms of its argument x. Here we a describe some basic properties related to the functionals and their use in density functional theory; more complete description can be found in [93], App. A. A review of functional derivatives or the “calculus of variations” can be found in [861] and [862].

Type
Chapter
Information
Electronic Structure
Basic Theory and Practical Methods
, pp. 476 - 478
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2004

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  • Functional equations
  • Richard M. Martin, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign
  • Book: Electronic Structure
  • Online publication: 05 June 2012
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511805769.029
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  • Functional equations
  • Richard M. Martin, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign
  • Book: Electronic Structure
  • Online publication: 05 June 2012
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511805769.029
Available formats
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  • Functional equations
  • Richard M. Martin, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign
  • Book: Electronic Structure
  • Online publication: 05 June 2012
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511805769.029
Available formats
×