Benchmarking and contrasting exchange-correlation functional differences in response to static correlation in unrestricted Kohn-Sham and a hybrid 1-electron reduced density matrix functional theory

Abstract: A hybrid Kohn-Sham Density Functional Theory (KS-DFT) and 1-electron Reduced Density Matrix Functional Theory (1-RDMFT) has recently been developed to describe strongly correlated systems at mean-field computational cost. This approach relies on combining a Reduced Density Matrix Functional to capture strong correlation effects with existing exchange correlation (XC) functionals to capture the remaining dynamical correlation effects. In this work, we systematically benchmark the performance of nearly 200 different XC functionals available within LibXC in this DFA 1-RDMFT framework, contrasting it with their performance in unrestricted KS-DFT. We identify optimal XC functionals for use within DFA 1-RDMFT and elucidate fundamental trends in the response of different XC functionals to strong correlation in both DFA 1-RDMFT and UKS-DFT.