Ground-state properties and optical conductivity of the transition metal oxide Sr₂VO₄

Combining first-principles calculations with a technique for many-body problems, we investigate the properties of the transition metal oxide Sr ₂VO₄ from the microscopic point of view. By using the local density approximation (LDA), the high-energy band structure is obtained, while screened Coulomb interactions are derived from the constrained LDA and the GW method. The renormalization of the kinetic energy is determined from the GW method. By these downfolding procedures, an effective Hamiltonian at low energies is derived. Applying the path integral renormalization group method to this Hamiltonian, we obtain ground-state properties such as the magnetic and orbital orders. Obtained results are consistent with available experimental data. We find that Sr₂VO₄ is close to the metal-insulator transition. Furthermore, because of the coexistence and competition of ferromagnetic and antiferromgnetic exchange interactions in this system, an antiferromagnetic and orbital-ordered state with a nontrivial and large unit cell structure is predicted in the ground state. The calculated optical conductivity shows characteristic shoulder structure in agreement with the experimental results. This suggests an orbital selective reduction of the Mott gap.