Exact Monte Carlo for few-fermion systems

Abstract

We have reconsidered the fundamental difficulties of fermion Monte Carlo as applied to few-body systems. We conclude that necessary ingredients of successful algorithms include the following: There must be equal populations of random walkers that carry positive and negative weights. The positions of positive walkers should be selected from a distribution that uses Green's functions to couple all walkers. The positions of negative walkers should be generated from those of positive walkers by means of odd permutations. The correct importance functions that take into account the global interactions of the populations are different for positive and negative walkers. Use of such importance functions breaks the symmetry that otherwise would exist between configurations (of the entire population) and configurations derived by interchanging positive and negative walkers. Based upon these observations, we have constructed a stable and accurate algorithm that solves a fully-polarized, three-dimensional, three-body model problem.