Model density approach to Ewald summations

Abstract: The evaluation of the electrostatic potential is fundamental to the study of condensed phase systems. We discuss the calculation of the relevant lattice summations by Ewald-type techniques. A model charge density is introduced, that cancels multipole moments of the crystalline charge distribution up to a desired order, for accelerating convergence of the Ewald sums. The method is applicable to calculations of bulk systems, employing arbitrary unit cells in a classical or quantum context, and with arbitrary basis functions to represent the charge density. The approach clarifies a decades-old implementation in the CRYSTAL code.