The Electronic Structure of some Body-Centred Cubic Metals

The electronic structure of a body-centred cubic metal is considered using the standard excited state extension of the equivalent orbital method. The form of the energy surfaces for both the standard excited state and the ground state is deduced in terms of a small number of parameters using the transformation properties of a determinant wave function. The energy expressions thus found do not depend on any analytical approximation to the wave functions nor on any arbitrary simplification of the theory. Values of the parameters for lithium and sodium are found by fitting the theoretical energies to energies calculated by other methods.