arXiv subjects

Sotiris S. Xantheas

Publications and source records attributed to Sotiris S. Xantheas.

7 recordsLinked to original sources

arXiv2026

Hunting for quantum advantage in electronic structure calculations is a highly non-trivial task

In light of major developments over the past decades in both quantum computing and simulations on classical hardware, it is a serious challenge to identify a real-world problem where quantum advantage is expected to appear. In quantum chemistry, electronic structure calculations of strongly correlated, i.e. multi-reference problems, are often argued to fall into such category because of their intractability with standard methods based on mean-field theory. Therefore, providing state-of-the-art benchmark data by classical algorithms is necessary to make a decisive conclusion when such competing development directions are compared. We report cutting-edge performance results together with high accuracy ground state energy for the Fe$_4$S$_4$ molecular cluster on a CAS(54,36) model space, a problem that has been included quite recently among the list of systems in the {\it Quantum Advantage Tracker} webpage maintained by IBM and RIKEN. Pushing the limits even further, we also present CAS-SCF based orbital optimizations for unprecedented CAS sizes of up to 89 electrons in 102 orbitals [CAS(89,102)] for the Fe$_5$S$_{12}$H$_4^{5-}$ molecular system comprising twenty five open shell orbitals in its sextet ground state and an active spaces size of 331 electrons in 451 orbitals. We have achieved our results via mixed-precision spin-adapted \textit{ab initio} Density Matrix Renormalization Group (DMRG) electronic structure calculations interfaced with the ORCA program package and utilizing the NVIDIA Blackwell graphics processing unit (GPU) platform. We argue that DMRG benchmark data should be taken as a classical reference when quantum advantage is reported. In addition, full exploitation of classical hardware should also be considered since even the most advanced DMRG implementations are still in a premature stage regarding utilization of all the benefits of GPU technology.

physics.chem-ph↗

arXiv2025

Optimizing Data Distribution and Kernel Performance for Efficient Training of Chemistry Foundation Models: A Case Study with MACE

Chemistry Foundation Models (CFMs) that leverage Graph Neural Networks (GNNs) operating on 3D molecular graph structures are becoming indispensable tools for computational chemists and materials scientists. These models facilitate the understanding of matter and the discovery of new molecules and materials. In contrast to GNNs operating on a large homogeneous graphs, GNNs used by CFMs process a large number of geometric graphs of varying sizes, requiring different optimization strategies than those developed for large homogeneous GNNs. This paper presents optimizations for two critical phases of CFM training: data distribution and model training, targeting MACE - a state-of-the-art CFM. We address the challenge of load balancing in data distribution by formulating it as a multi-objective bin packing problem. We propose an iterative algorithm that provides a highly effective, fast, and practical solution, ensuring efficient data distribution. For the training phase, we identify symmetric tensor contraction as the key computational kernel in MACE and optimize this kernel to improve the overall performance. Our combined approach of balanced data distribution and kernel optimization significantly enhances the training process of MACE. Experimental results demonstrate a substantial speedup, reducing per-epoch execution time for training from 12 to 2 minutes on 740 GPUs with a 2.6M sample dataset.

cs.DC↗

arXiv2025

Orbital optimization of large active spaces via AI-accelerators

We present an efficient orbital optimization procedure that combines the highly GPU accelerated, spin-adapted density matrix renormalization group (DMRG) method with the complete active space self-consistent field (CAS-SCF) approach for quantum chemistry implemented in the ORCA program package. Leveraging the computational power of the latest generation of Nvidia GPU hardware, we perform CAS-SCF based orbital optimizations for unprecedented CAS sizes of up to 82 electrons in 82 orbitals [CAS(82,82)] in molecular systems comprising of active spaces sizes of hundreds of electrons in thousands of orbitals. For both the NVIDIA DGX-A100 and DGX-H100 hardware, we provide a detailed scaling and error analysis of our DMRG-SCF approach for benchmark systems consisting of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons and iron-sulfur complexes of varying sizes. Our efforts demonstrate for the first time that highly accurate DMRG calculations at large bond dimensions are critical for obtaining reliably converged CAS-SCF energies. For the more challenging iron-sulfur benchmark systems, we furthermore find the optimized orbitals of a converged CAS-SCF calculation to depend more sensitively on the DMRG parameters than those for the polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons. The ability to obtain converged CAS-SCF energies and orbitals for active spaces of such large sizes within days reduces the challenges of including the appropriate orbitals into the CAS or selecting the correct minimal CAS, and may open up entirely new avenues for tackling strongly correlated molecular systems.

physics.chem-ph↗

arXiv2024

Parallel implementation of the Density Matrix Renormalization Group method achieving a quarter petaFLOPS performance on a single DGX-H100 GPU node

We report cutting edge performance results for a hybrid CPU-multi GPU implementation of the spin adapted ab initio Density Matrix Renormalization Group (DMRG) method on current state-of-the-art NVIDIA DGX-H100 architectures. We evaluate the performance of the DMRG electronic structure calculations for the active compounds of the FeMoco and cytochrome P450 (CYP) enzymes with complete active space (CAS) sizes of up to 113 electrons in 76 orbitals [CAS(113, 76)] and 63 electrons in 58 orbitals [CAS(63, 58)], respectively. We achieve 246 teraFLOPS of sustained performance, an improvement of more than 2.5x compared to the performance achieved on the DGX-A100 architectures and an 80x acceleration compared to an OpenMP parallelized implementation on a 128-core CPU architecture. Our work highlights the ability of tensor network algorithms to efficiently utilize high-performance GPU hardware and shows that the combination of tensor networks with modern large-scale GPU accelerators can pave the way towards solving some of the most challenging problems in quantum chemistry and beyond.

physics.chem-ph↗

arXiv2022

Vibrational Levels of a Generalized Morse Potential

A Generalized Morse Potential (GMP) is an extension of the Morse Potential (MP) with an additional exponential term and an additional parameter that compensate for MP's erroneous behavior in the long range part of the interaction potential. Because of the additional term and parameter, the vibrational levels of the GMP cannot be solved analytically, unlike the case for the MP. We present several numerical approaches for solving the vibrational problem of the GMP based on Galerkin methods, namely the Laguerre Polynomial Method (LPM), the Symmetrized Laguerre Polynomial Method (SLPM) and the Polynomial Expansion method (PEM) and apply them to the vibrational levels of the homonuclear diatomic molecules B$_2$, O$_2$ and F$_2$, for which high level theoretical Full CI potential energy surfaces and experimentally measured vibrational levels have been reported. Overall the LPM produces vibrational states for the GMP that are converged to within spectroscopic accuracy of 0.01 cm$^{-1}$ in between 1 and 2 orders of magnitude faster and with much fewer basis functions / grid points than the Colbert-Miller Discrete Variable Representation (CM-DVR) method for the three homonuclear diatomic molecules examined in this study.

physics.chem-ph↗

arXiv2021

The Effect of Geometry, Spin and Orbital Optimization in Achieving Accurate, Fully-Correlated Results for Iron-Sulfur Cubanes

Iron-sulfur clusters comprise an important functional motif of the catalytic centers of biological systems, capable of enabling important chemical transformations at ambient conditions. This remarkable capability derives from a notoriously complex electronic structure that is characterized by a high density of states that is sensitive to geometric changes. The spectral sensitivity to subtle geometric changes has received little attention from fully-correlated calculations, owing partly to the exceptional computational complexity for treating these large and correlated systems accurately. To provide insight into this aspect, we report the first Complete Active Space Self Consistent Field (CASSCF) calculations for different geometries of cubane-based clusters using two complementary, fully-correlated solvers: spin-pure Adaptive Sampling Configuration Interaction (ASCI) and Density Matrix Renormalization Group (DMRG). We find that the previously established picture of a double-exchange driven magnetic structure, with minute energy gaps (< 1 mHa) between consecutive spin states, has a weak dependence on the underlying geometry. However, the spin gap between the lowest singlet and the highest spin states is strongly geometry dependent, changing by an order of magnitude upon slight deformations that are still within biologically relevant parameters. The CASSCF orbital optimization procedure, using active spaces as large as 86 electrons in 52 orbitals, was found to reduce this gap by a factor of two compared to typical mean-field orbital approaches. Our results clearly demonstrate the need for performing highly correlated calculations to unveil the challenging electronic structure of these complex catalytic centers.

physics.chem-ph↗

arXiv2020

HydroNet: Benchmark Tasks for Preserving Intermolecular Interactions and Structural Motifs in Predictive and Generative Models for Molecular Data

Intermolecular and long-range interactions are central to phenomena as diverse as gene regulation, topological states of quantum materials, electrolyte transport in batteries, and the universal solvation properties of water. We present a set of challenge problems for preserving intermolecular interactions and structural motifs in machine-learning approaches to chemical problems, through the use of a recently published dataset of 4.95 million water clusters held together by hydrogen bonding interactions and resulting in longer range structural patterns. The dataset provides spatial coordinates as well as two types of graph representations, to accommodate a variety of machine-learning practices.

cs.LG↗