Electrical Conductivity of Warm Dense Hydrogen from Ohm's Law and Time-Dependent Density Functional Theory

TL;DR

This paper introduces a method combining Ohm's law and real-time time-dependent density functional theory to accurately compute the electrical conductivity of warm dense hydrogen across a wide range of conditions.

Contribution

It presents a novel computational approach that effectively models electronic transport in warm dense matter using real-time TDDFT and addresses finite-size errors.

Findings

Good agreement with other methods validates the approach

Method is feasible for a range of temperatures and densities

Reliable simulation of hydrogen's dynamic response in warm dense state

Abstract

Understanding the electrical conductivity of warm dense hydrogen is critical for both fundamental physics and applications in planetary science and inertial confinement fusion. We demonstrate how to calculate the electrical conductivity using the continuum form of Ohm's law, with the current density obtained from real-time time-dependent density functional theory. This approach simulates the dynamic response of hydrogen under warm dense matter conditions, with temperatures around 30,000 K and mass densities ranging from 0.02 to 0.98 g/cc. We systematically address finite-size errors in real-time time-dependent density functional theory, demonstrating that our calculations are both numerically feasible and reliable. Our results show good agreement with other approaches, highlighting the effectiveness of this method for modeling electronic transport properties from ambient to extreme conditions.