Obtaining Electronic Properties of Molecules through Combining Density Functional Tight Binding with Machine Learning.

Journal: The journal of physical chemistry letters
Published Date:

Abstract

We have introduced a machine learning workflow that allows for optimizing electronic properties in the density functional tight binding method (DFTB). The workflow allows for the optimization of electronic properties by generating two-center integrals, either by training basis function parameters directly or by training a spline model for the diatomic integrals, which are then used to build the Hamiltonian and the overlap matrices. Using our workflow, we have managed to obtain improved electronic properties, such as charge distributions, dipole moments, and approximated polarizabilities. While both machine learning approaches enabled us to improve on the electronic properties of the molecules as compared with existing DFTB parametrizations, only by training on the basis function parameters we were able to obtain consistent Hamiltonians and overlap matrices in the physically reasonable ranges or to improve on multiple electronic properties simultaneously.

Authors

  • Guozheng Fan
    Bremen Center for Computational Materials Science, University of Bremen, 28359Bremen, Germany.
  • Adam McSloy
    Bremen Center for Computational Materials Science, University of Bremen, 28359Bremen, Germany.
  • Bálint Aradi
    Bremen Center for Computational Materials Science, University of Bremen, 28359Bremen, Germany.
  • Chi-Yung Yam
    Shenzhen Institute for Advanced Study, University of Electronic Science and Technology of China, Shenzhen, 518000China.
  • Thomas Frauenheim
    Bremen Center for Computational Materials Science, University of Bremen, 28359Bremen, Germany.