Explicit core-hole single-particle methods for L- and M- edge X-ray absorption and electron energy-loss spectra

Abstract: Single-particle methods based on Kohn-Sham unoccupied states to describe near-edge X-ray absorption (XAS) spectra are routinely applied for the description of K-edge spectra, as there is no complication due to spin-orbit (SO) coupling. L- and M-edge spectra are often addressed via variants of time-dependent density functional theory (TDDFT) based on SO calculations. Here, we present a computationally efficient implementation based on single-particle calculations with core holes within the frozen-core approximation. Combined with a semiempirical energy shift and a fixed spin-orbit splitting, this allows for a prediction of experimental spectra on the absolute energy scale. Such spectra are compared to linear-response TDDFT for molecules and show similar or even better match with experiment, except for multiplet effects that are not covered by the single-particle approximation. A similar picture emerges for solids, where good qualitative and sometimes even quantitative agreement to XAS and electron energy-loss spectra is achieved.